Dr. Munro has done this as well as the limiting conditions would allow. At any rate the materials are never jumbled together, as is unfortunately often the case in works of a similar kind; and the whole arrangement is so clear that the reader will have no difficulty in finding anything he happens to want, even without the aid of the very full index at the end of the volume.

After the supreme interest attaching to the first discovery of lake-dwellings in Switzerland, perhaps no event which followed was more important, as regards its archæological results, than what is known as the "Correction des Eaux du Jura", described in the first Lecture. Dr. Munro says "It is often the case that antiquarian remains owe their discovery to the mere accident of agricultural operations, peat-cutting, drainage, etc. Such operations are, however, usually confined to small lakes and bogs. The idea of partially lowering the surface of the extensive sheets of water in the Jura Valley, comprising the Lakes of Bienne, Neuchâtel, and Morat, was too chimerical to be ever entertained in the interests of archæology. But what was inconceivable, and utterly beyond hope, from this point of view, became, in the interests of agriculture, an accomplished fact." The water from the Lake of Morat flowed through the Broye into the Lake of Neuchâtel, thence through the Thielle into the Lake of Bienne, and lastly through the Zihl (or Lower Thielle) into the river Aar. The silting up of the channels connecting these three Lakes, and of the outflow into the Aar, rendered the surrounding lands continually liable to floods. "To remedy these defects the Swiss Government entered on the gigantic project of rectifying and deepening the entire water from the junction of the Lower Thielle with the Aar, to the mouth of the Broye in Lake Morat." The scheme also included the cutting of a new channel for the Aar, by means of which it would be entirely diverted from its old course, and made to debouch into Lake Bienue by a straight and much shorter route.

"The hydrographical result of these works (which were begun in 1868, and only completed a few years ago) was to lower the surface of the Lakes to the extent of 6 or 8 ft. In the winter of 1871-2 the operations began to tell on Lake Bienne; but it was some years later before the others became sensibly affected. When, however, the works were completed, the permanent effect on these Lakes, especially on Lake Neuchâtel, was very marked,-harbours, jetties, and extensive tracts of shore-land, being left high and dry by the subsiding waters. This was the harvest-time of archæology. Many of the lacustrine abodes became dry land, and were visited by crowds of eager searchers; even fishermen forsook their normal avocations, finding it more profitable to fish for prehistoric relics.... Thus the Correction des Eaux du Jura', as the undertaking was called, greatly facilitated the investigations of the Swiss lakedwellings, and contributed enormously to the elucidation of the culture and civilisation of their inhabitants.”

Dr. Munro not only describes very minutely all the circumstances

attending the exploration of the lake-dwellings in different parts of Switzerland, but he also gives illustrations of a vast number of objects obtained from them, ranging from the neolithic age to the Roman period. To the English antiquary, accustomed to found his conclusions on a few stray implements derived from burialmounds, or valuables lost or hidden by their owners in times gone by, it must be quite a revelation to see for the first time such a complete series of every conceivable utensil required for domestic purposes, artificers' tools of all kinds, weapons of so many forms, and personal ornaments exhibiting such a great variety of design. Amongst the most instructive objects of the neolithic age are the polished stone axes and flint tools still fixed in their original handles. Such things have been so rarely found in a complete state in this country, that it has only been possible to conjecture the manner in which stone axes were hafted by comparing them with the specimens in use amongst savage tribes. Until a flint implement is seen fixed in a wooden or bone handle, it is difficult to understand how it could really be employed practically as a cutting tool. All doubt as to the methods of hafting flints is, however, set at rest by the discoveries in the Swiss lake-dwellings.

A full discussion of the objects from the lake-dwellings would cover almost the whole field of archæology, so that it will only be possible here to refer to one or two of special interest. Amongst these attention is specially directed to a wooden machine, supposed to be a beaver-trap, discovered at Laibach in Austria (illustrated on p. 179). A similar machine was found at Nant y Vast, in the parish of Caio, in Cardiganshire, and is now preserved at St. David's College, Lampeter. It has been described by the Rev. E. L. Barnwell in the Archeologia Cambrensis (4th Series, vol. x, p. 188). Many suggestions have been made as to the use of such machines; amongst others, that they were cheese-presses, or pumps, or for making peats, or musical instruments, or fish-traps. The Rev. E. L. Barnwell does not seem to have known of any foreign specimens, and only mentions one besides the Welsh example, which was found in the county of Derry, in Ireland. Dr. Munro gives instances of others from North Germany and Italy. The machines are all of the same pattern, consisting of a solid block of wood, from 2 ft. 6 ins. to 3 ft. 6 ins. long, by 6 to 12 ins. wide by 3 to 4 ins. deep, having a rectangular hole cut right through the centre, and fitted with either one or two valves turning on a hinge, and opening only in one direction. The block is hollowed out on the side towards which the doors open.

Associated with the machine from Italy were several small pieces of artificially shaped wood, apparently the débris of some kind of mechanism attached to it. The hollow on one side is evidently made to receive some of the other working parts, which may have been of the nature of springs, to keep the valves closed. Dr. Munro says, "At no time within historical times were such machines known to be in use, so that their function still remains conjectural,

unless the circumstantial evidence (i.e., the finding of a great number of bones of the beaver amongst the food-refuse of this lakedwelling) derived from the Pfahlbau at Laibach decides them to be "Biberfälle"; and a little further on he remarks that, "To find so many of these machines, of unknown use, and so remarkably similar in structure, in such widely separate districts as Ireland, North Germany, Styria, and Italy, must be a matter of interest to archæologists; and no one can say that the correct explanation of their use is to be found in any of the suggestions hitherto offered. I may mention one element which may help in the solution of the problem, viz., that all the examples from Italy, Laibach, and Ireland, were found in bogs that were formerly lakes. ..... If these machines are really traps, they could only be used in water where the animal could insert its head from below; and among amphibious animals, the otter and the beaver are the only ones to which all the conditions involved in the trap-theory could apply.

Interesting as it would be to pursue this subject further, we must pass on to other matters. The wooden wheels from the Torbiera di Mercurago (illustrated on pp. 208 and 209) are extremely instructive as showing how the modern, many-spoked wheel was gradually evolved from a solid disc of wood. The wheels of carts now in use in India, of which models may be seen in the Indian Museum at South Kensington, are in the same early stage of development as those found in the lake-dwellings.

In describing the Terremare of the Po Valley, and the Terpen of Holland, Dr. Munro opens up new fields of archæology which are comparatively unknown at present in this country. The name "Terramara" is one applied in scientific circles to an earthy substance possessing valuable qualities as a manure, which is derived from certain artificial mounds in the provinces of Parma, Reggio, and Modena. Whilst excavating these mounds for agricultural purposes, various antiquities were noticed by the workmen, leading to the belief, in the first instance, that the deposits were sepulchral. The investigations, however, carried out by Strobel and Pigorini in the neighbourhood of Parma, in 1861-64, conclusively showed that "the terremare must be considered as the remains of the habitations of the living, and not, as hitherto supposed, the resting-places of the dead."

The existence of pile-structures, and the deposition of the earth in stratified layers, still required to be explained, and to Chierici belongs the credit of solving the problem of the true nature of the terramare mounds in 1871. He maintained that they were the sites of villages, not on dry land, but lake-dwellings occupying a rectangular area surrounded by an earthen dyke, forming an artificial basin supplied with water from a neighbouring stream. The special investigations carried out at Castione under the superin

1 Dr. Munro has, since the publication of his book, read a paper on this subject before the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland.

tendence of Pigorini in 1871, further elucidated the subject by showing the whole method of construction of the dykes, platforms, etc., and making it clear that the height of the mounds could be explained by the theory that when the space below the huts was filled up with refuse of food, etc., thrown down below, a second structure was erected on the site of the older one. The objects from the terramare belong chiefly to the late stone and bronze ages. Amongst the antiquities deserving special mention are bronze razors similar to those found in Great Britain, bone combs with a handle like that of a bell at the top, and pottery vessels elegantly ornamented with crescent-shaped projections.

The Terp mounds of Holland, like the terramare, first became known on account of the value of the earth contained in them as a fertilising agent. They afterwards proved to be the remains of marine pile-dwellings, for an account of which the reader must consult Dr. Munro's valuable work.

To those interested in the origin of Celtic art in Great Britain no part of Dr. Munro's book is more suggestive than the fourth Lecture on the "Special Character of the Remains found at La Tène”, more especially since Mr. Arthur Evans' paper on a "Late Celtic Cemetery at Aylesford" has appeared in the Archæologia. La Tène is situated at the north end of Lake Neuchâtel. The objects found there are of the iron age, and differ entirely from those obtained from the other lake-dwellings of Switzerland. The ornamental features occurring on the bronze sword-sheaths are so peculiar and so unmistakable that "La Tène" has become a generic term to describe objects exhibiting a similar style of decoration found elsewhere on the Continent. Weapons, etc., of the "La Tène" type have been discovered in France and North Italy; but Dr. Munro believes that the central home of this kind of art was the middle and upper Rhine districts, Baden, Bavaria, and eastwards to Bohemia and Laibach. The name "Late Celtic" has been given by Mr. A. W. Franks to antiquities of the "La Tène" type from different parts of Great Britain, of which the largest collection is to be seen in the British Museum. The predominance of the divergent spiral is one of the chief characteristics of " Late Celtic" ornament; and a study of the spiral patterns in early Irish illuminated MSS. will at once convince any one that Celtic art of the Christian period was merely a modification of the pagan Celtic art which preceded it. Mr. Franks has conclusively demonstrated, in his Horæ Ferales, that the "Late Celtic" period in Britain was about 200 to 100 B.C.; and the age of the Gaulish coins associated with some of the finds abroad tends to show that the "La Tène" civilisation belongs to the same period and race. The nature of the "Late Celtic" and "La Tène" objects, which consist principally of weapons, horse-trappings, and chariots, show that the people who used them were essentially a warlike, and in all probability a conquering

race.

The whole question of the introduction of "La Tène" civilisation

into Europe is one in which the most important issues are involved. Dr. Munro's views on a subject about which he is so competent to give an opinion must receive the careful consideration of all English archæologists. He holds that the transition from the neolithic age to the bronze age was a gradual and a peaceful one, the same people having occupied the Swiss lake-dwellings throughout both periods; but with regard to the transition from the bronze to the iron age it was different. "In short, the evolutionary stage between the melting of bronze and the forging of iron is here represented by a hiatus between the styles of art of the two periods more striking than that which distinguishes the neolithic from the paleolithic industrial remains. So far as I have looked into these matters I can only conclude that with the introduction of iron into general use in Switzerland, we have a new people who conquered and subjugated the lake-dwellers, and gave the death-blow to their system of lakevillages. Henceforth these villages fell into decay, and in the general destruction which ensued these 'La Tène' implements might have been introduced by the invaders."

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Dr.

Dr. Munro's theories are opposed to those of Dr. Keller, viz., that the lake-dwellers of the stone and bronze ages were Celts. Munro hazards the opinion that the original founders of the lakedwellings of Central Europe were part of the first neolithic immigrants who entered the country by the regions surrounding the Black Sea and the shore of the Mediterranean, and spread westwards along the Danube and its tributaries till they reached the great central lakes." Also he says that "the few indications derived from the data supplied by lake-dwelling research suggests the idea that the evolution of the Celts in Europe coincides with the substitution of iron for bronze in the manufacture of the more important cutting implements and weapons."

It is now with the utmost regret that we are obliged to take leave of Dr. Munro's excellent work, still leaving untouched a host of interesting subjects. It is a treatise which throws more light on the civilisation and culture of the prehistoric inhabitants of Europe than any other which has yet been published, and it must for a long time remain the standard book of reference on lake-dwellings in the English language. The Scotch school of scientific archæology, which owes its origin to such men as Sir Arthur Mitchell and Dr. Joseph Anderson, has produced no work more likely to do credit to its founders, or to the author, than Dr. Munro's Lake-Dwellings of Europe.