Primitive Man Part 24

The lacustrine settlements of Switzerland, when considered under the heads of the various pre-historical epochs to which they belong, may be divided in the following way:--

_The Stone Age_:--The Lake of Constance (about thirty settlements); the Lake of Neuchatel (twelve settlements); the Lake of Geneva (two settlements); the Lake of Morat (one settlement); the lakes of Bienne, Zurich, Pfaeffikon, Inkwyl, Moosseedorf, Nussbaumen, w.a.n.ger, &c.; the settlements of Saint-Aubin and Concise, the peat-bog of Wauwyl, and the settlement at the Bridge of Thiele.

_The Bronze Epoch_:--The Lake of Geneva (twenty settlements); the Lake of Neuchatel (twenty-five settlements); the Lake of Bienne (ten settlements); also the lakes of Morat and Sempach.

_The Iron Epoch_:--The lakes of Neuchatel and Bienne.

It may appear strange that the primitive inhabitants of Switzerland should have preferred aquatic dwellings to habitations built on _terra firma_, which could certainly have been constructed much more easily.

Further on in our work we shall have something to say as to the advantages which men might derive from such a peculiar arrangement of their dwellings; but we may now remark that this custom was somewhat prevalent among the earliest inhabitants of Europe. Ancient history furnishes us with several instances of it. Herodotus, speaking of the Paeonians, of the Lake Prasias, in Thrace, says:--

"Their habitations are built in the following way. On long piles, sunk into the bottom of the lake, planks are placed, forming a floor; a narrow bridge is the means of access to them. These piles used to be fixed by the inhabitants at their joint expense; but afterwards it was settled that each man should bring three from Mount Orbelus for every woman whom he married. Plurality of wives, be it observed, was permitted in this country. On these planks each has his hut with a trap-door down into the lake; and lest any of their children should fall through this opening they took care to attach a cord to their feet. They used to feed their horses and beasts of burden on fish. In this lake fish was so abundant that if a basket was let down through the trap-door it might be drawn up a short time afterwards filled with fish."

Sir J. Lubbock, repeating the statement of one of his friends who resides at Salonica, a.s.serts that the fishermen of the Lake Prasias still inhabit wooden huts built over the water, as in the time of Herodotus. There is nothing improbable in this, since the town of Tcherkask in Russia is constructed in a similar way over the River Don, and Venice itself is nothing but a lacustrine city built during historic times over a lagune of the Adriatic sea.

We may add that even in modern times this custom of building villages on piles still exists in some parts of the world. According to the evidence of Dampier and Dumont d'Urville, habitations built on piles are to be met with in New Guinea, Celebes, Ceram, Mindanao, the Caroline Islands, &c. The city of Borneo is, indeed, entirely built on this plan. In some of the isles of the Pacific Ocean there are several tribes of savages who likewise make their dwellings over water. The Indians of Venezuela have adopted this custom with the sole intention of sheltering themselves from the mosquitoes.

It is quite permissible to suppose that the need for security was the motive which induced the ancient inhabitants of Switzerland, and other countries, thus to make settlements and live upon the lakes. Surrounded as they were by vast marshes and impenetrable forests, they lived in dread of the attacks of numerous wild beasts. They therefore taxed their ingenuity to insure their safety as far as they possibly could, and no means appeared more efficacious than that of surrounding themselves with water. At a subsequent period, when men commenced to make war against one another, these aquatic habitations became still more valuable. They then const.i.tuted something in the nature of camps or fortification in which, being well-protected from all danger of sudden surprise, the people of the country could defy the efforts of their enemies.

We must, however, add, that in more recent times these buildings on piles were--according to M. Desor--used only as storehouses for utensils and provisions; the actual dwellings for men being built on _terra firma_.

These lacustrine dwellings are designated under various names by different authors. Dr. Keller, who was the first to describe them, gave them in German the name of _pfahlbauten_ (buildings on piles) which the Italians have translated by the word _palafitta_. This latter appellation, when gallicized by M. Desor, becomes _palafitte_. Lastly, the name _tenevieres_ or _steinbergs_ (mountains of stone) is given to constructions of a peculiar character in which the piles are kept up by ma.s.ses of stone which have been brought to the spot. By Dr. Keller, this latter kind are called _packwerkbauten_.

When we examine as a whole the character of the lacustrine settlements which have hitherto been discovered, it may, in fact, be perceived that those who built them proceeded on two different systems of construction; either, they buried the piles very deeply in the bed of the lake, and on these piles placed the platform which was to support their huts; or, they artificially raised the bed of the lake by means of heaps of stones, fixing in these heaps somewhat large stakes, not so much for the purpose of supporting the habitations themselves as with a view of making the heaps of stones a firm and compact body.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 148.--Section of the _Teneviere_ of Hauterive.]

This latter mode of construction is represented in fig. 148, taken from a design given by M. Desor in his remarkable work 'Les Palafittes.'[33]

One or the other of these modes of construction was employed according to the nature of the bed of the lake. In lakes with a muddy bottom, the first plan could be easily employed; but when the bed was rocky, it was necessary to have recourse to the second. This is the reason why on the northern sh.o.r.e of the Lake of Neuchatel, where the banks of limestone come very close to the surface, a comparatively large number of _tenevieres_ may be observed.

These are the facts as generally noticed, especially in wide and deep lakes; the edifice, however, was not always constructed in this mode. In marshes and small lakes, which have now become peat-bogs, another system was frequently applied, a remarkable instance of which is furnished by the peat-moss at Wauwyl. In this locality were found several quadrangular s.p.a.ces very distinctly enclosed by piles, between which were raised as many as five platforms one above the other. These piles are naturally very long, and some are buried as much as seven feet in the solid ground--an operation which must have required an enormous amount of labour. The intervals between the platforms are filled up with boughs of trees and clay, and the floors themselves are made in nearly the same way as those we have before mentioned. The lowest rested directly on the bed of the lake, and on the upper one the huts were placed.

It is sometimes the case that these heaps of stones rise above the water; they then form perfect artificial islands, and the habitations which covered them are no longer, properly speaking, dwellings on piles.

Of this kind is the station on the Lake of Inkwyl in Switzerland; of this kind, also, are the _crannoges_ of Ireland, of which we shall subsequently make special mention. Some of these artificial islands have braved the destructive action of ages, and are still inhabited at the present time. M. Desor mentions the Isle of Roses in the Lake of Starnberg (Bavaria) which has never been known to have been unfrequented by man; it now contains a royal residence.

Let us revert to the mode of construction of the aquatic dwellings of Switzerland.

In all probability the stones used were conveyed to the required spot by means of canoes made of hollowed-out trunks of trees. Several of these canoes may still be seen at the bottom of Lake Bienne, and one, indeed, is still laden with pebbles, which leads us to think that it must have foundered with its cargo. But it is very difficult to raise these canoes from the bottom, and it is, besides, probable that when exposed to the open air they would fall to dust. Nevertheless, one of them is exhibited in the Museum at Neuchatel.

In the Museum at Saint-Germain there is a canoe very similar to that of Neuchatel. It is made out of the trunk of a hollow tree. A second canoe, very like the first, but with the bark still on it, and in a bad state of preservation, lies in the entry of the same Museum of Saint-Germain.

It was taken out of the Seine, as we stated when speaking in a previous chapter of the first discovery of the art of navigation during the Stone Age.

It may very easily be explained how the constructors went to work in felling the trees and converting them into piles. M. Desor has remarked that the pieces of wood composing the piles are cut cleanly through round their circ.u.mference only; the central part shows inequalities just like those which are noticed when a stick is broken in two by the hand after having been cut into all round the outside. The builders of the lacustrine villages, therefore, when they wanted to fell a tree must have acted much as follows: having cut all round it to a depth of 3 or 4 inches, they fixed a cord to the top, and broke the tree down by forcibly pulling at the upper part. They then cut it through in the same way with stone or bronze hatchets, giving it the requisite length, hewing it into a point at one end so that it should more easily penetrate the mud. Sometimes a fire applied to the base of the tree prepared for, and facilitated, the effect of the sharp instruments used.

A great number of the piles that have been found still bear the marks of the fire and the cuts made by stone hatchets. In constructing the _tenevieres_, the labour of pointing the piles was needless, as the latter were thoroughly wedged in by the acc.u.mulation of stones of which we gave a representation in fig. 148.

When the piles were prepared, they had to be floated to the spot fixed upon for the village, and to be fixed in the bed of the lake. If we consider that, in many cases, the length of these piles reached to as much as 16 or 20 feet, some idea may be formed of the difficulty of an undertaking of this kind. In the construction of the _tenevieres_ much thicker piles were used, and the labour was much less difficult. For instance, in the more ancient _tenevieres_ of the Lake of Neuchatel piles are found made of whole trunks of trees which measure 10 to 12 inches in diameter.

The mind is almost confused when it endeavours to sum up the amount of energy and strong will which the primitive population of Switzerland must have bestowed on constructing, unaided as they were by metal implements, the earliest lacustrine settlements, some of which are of very considerable extent. The settlement of Morges, one of the largest in the Lake of Geneva, is not less than 71,000 square yards in area.

That of Chabrey, in the Lake of Neuchatel, measures about 60,000 square yards; another, in the same lake, 48,000 yards; and, lastly, a third, that of La Tene, 36,000 yards. There are many others which are smaller, although of respectable dimensions.

The number of piles which must have been used in some of these constructions is really surprising. M. Lohle has calculated that in the single lacustrine village of w.a.n.gen, in the Lake of Constance, at least 40,000 piles have been fixed, and that several generations must have been necessary to terminate the work. The more reasonable interpretation to give to a fact of this kind is that w.a.n.gen, which was very thinly populated at first, increased in size gradually as the numbers of inhabitants augmented. The same remark may be doubtless applied to all the important stations.

This was the plan employed in building a single habitation. When a whole village had to be built in the open water, a methodical course of action was adopted. They began by placing a certain number of piles parallel to the sh.o.r.e, and these they at once threw across the bridge which was intended to connect the village with the land, thus rendering the carriage of the materials much less difficult.

When the bridge was finished, and before fixing all the piles, the platform was commenced immediately; this const.i.tuted a base of operations, by the help of which the pile work could more easily be finished.

This platform was raised 3 or 4 feet above the surface of the water, so as to obviate any danger arising from the waves during a tempest. It was generally composed of branches and trunks of trees not squared, and bound horizontally to each other, the whole cemented together with clay; sometimes, also, they used thick rough slabs, which were obtained by splitting trunks of trees with wedges. The platform was fixed firmly on the pile-work, and in some cases wooden pegs were used to fasten together the largest pieces of timber, so that the cohesion and incorporation of the floor were rendered more complete. As soon as the esplanade was finished, they then proceeded to the construction of the huts.

The huts must have opened on to the platform by doors. Did they possess windows? Nothing is known as to this point. But in all probability there was an opening at the top of the roof, through which the smoke of the fire made its way. To avoid any fear of conflagration, a stone fire-place was placed in the middle of each dwelling. The daylight must have come in through the hole in the roof in a quant.i.ty almost sufficient to cause the absence of windows to be not much felt.

In each habitation, there was, no doubt, a trap-door in direct communication with the lake, such as those which existed in the dwellings of the Paeonians described by Herodotus. Under this trap-door there was a reservoir made of osiers, intended for the preservation of fish.

As the inhabitants of the lacustrine villages only lived upon the water with a view of increasing their security, it would be absurd to suppose that they would construct a large number of bridges between their aquatic settlement and the banks of the lake. There must have been, in general, but one bridge for each of these lake villages.

How were the huts constructed, and what were their shape and dimensions?

These questions certainly seem difficult to answer, for, as may be well imagined, no specimen of these ancient dwellings has been preserved to our days. Nevertheless, a few relics, insignificant in appearance, enable us to reply to these inquiries in a way more or less satisfactory.

Everything seems to indicate that the huts were formed of trunks of trees placed upright, one by the side of the other, and bound together horizontally by interwoven branches. A coating of earth covered this wattling.

It has been fancied, from the imprint left by some of the branches which were used in building these huts, that it might be inferred that they were circular, like those which historians attribute to the ancient Gauls. This was Troyon's opinion, and at first Dr. Keller's also. This author has even sketched a circular hut in a plate representing a restored lacustrine habitation, which accompanies one of his memoirs.

Sir C. Lyell, also, has reproduced this same plate in the frontispiece of his work on the 'Antiquity of Man.' But Dr. Keller has subsequently abandoned this idea, and in another of his memoirs he has supplied a fresh design showing nothing but huts with flat or sloping roofs.

From this latter plate, taken from Dr. Keller's work, we here give a representation of a Swiss lacustrine village (fig. 149).

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 149--A Swiss Lake Village of the Bronze Epoch.]

The suggestions for this reconstructive sketch were furnished to Dr.

Keller not only by various scientific indications, but also and especially by a drawing made by Dumont d'Urville among the Papuans of New Guinea.

According to Dr. Keller, during the last century there still existed on the river Limmat, near Zurich, some fishermen's huts built in a similar way to those of the lacustrine villages.

What might have been the population of one of these settlements? This estimate M. Troyon endeavoured to make--an undertaking of a very interesting nature. He adopted as the base of his calculations the lacustrine village of Morges (Lake of Geneva), which, as we have already stated, had an area of 71,000 square yards. Allowing that only one-half of this area was occupied by huts, the other half being reserved for gangways between the dwellings, and a.s.suming an average diameter of 16 feet for each hut, M. Troyon reckoned the number of dwellings in the pre-historic village of Morges at 311. Next, supposing that four individuals lived in each hut, the total amount of population he arrived at was 1244 inhabitants.

We might very justly be surprised if men of the bronze epoch, who were provided with metallic weapons, and were consequently in a much better position for resisting any violent attack, had continued to dwell exclusively in the midst of the water, and should not, to some extent, have dispersed over _terra firma_, which is man's natural standing-ground. It was, therefore, nothing more than might have been expected, when the discovery was made of the relics of dwellings upon land, containing remains of the bronze epoch. This discovery, in fact, took place, and those investigating the subject came to the conclusion that the valleys of Switzerland, as well as the lakes, were occupied during this period by an industrious and agricultural people.

At Ebersberg, canton of Zurich, there was discovered--which is a very curious fact--the remains of an ancient settlement situated on _terra firma_, and containing utensils similar to those found in the lacustrine settlements. In 1864, Dr. Clement searched several mounds composed of pebbles bearing the traces of fire; these mounds were situated in the neighbourhood of Gorgier (canton of Neuchatel). One of these mounds has furnished various objects of bronze intermingled with fragments of charcoal, especially a bracelet and some sickles characterised by a projection or set-off at the spring of the blade.

On the plateau of Granges (canton of Soleure), Dr. Schild studied a certain spot which he considers to be the site of an ancient bronze foundry; for, besides finding there pebbles and calcined earth, he also discovered a number of reaping-hooks made with a shoulder, and also a fragment of a sword and four finely-made knives.

A hatchet-knife was likewise found in the gorge of the Seyon, near Neuchatel; and a bracelet in the vicinity of Morges (canton of Geneva).

Some other bracelets, accompanied by calcined human bones, were discovered near Sion, in the Valais.

Lastly, M. Thioly obtained from a cave of Mont Saleve, near Geneva, numerous fragments of pottery of the bronze epoch; and in a grotto on the banks of the Reuse, in the canton of Neuchatel, M. Otz found relics of pottery of very fine clay, along with a quant.i.ty of bones.

Thus the people of this epoch did not dwell exclusively in settlements made over the water. They also were in the habit of building habitations on _terra firma_, and of furnishing them with everything which was necessary for existence.

All the facts which have been observed in Switzerland may, doubtless, be applied generally; and it may be said that during the bronze epoch the nature of man's habitation became decidedly fixed. The caves of the great bear and mammoth period, and the rock-shelters of the reindeer and polished-stone periods were now succeeded by dwelling-places which differ but little from those of the more civilised peoples who commence the era of historic times.