Perhaps the greatest event in the history of anthropology was the discovery, in a limestone cave in the Neanderthal, a small gorge near Diisseldorf, Germany, in 1856, of the frag mentary skeleton of a man apparently con temporaneous, like the men of Engis, with the well-known mammoth and wooly rhinoceros, the bones of which were found later in similar caves nearby. Examination of the human bones re vealed surprising differences from modern Euro peans or indeed any race of living man, or even the Engis man. This was especially striking in the calvaria or skull-cap, which was marked by an excessively low crown and heavy supra-or bital ridges extending the entire width of the forehead. This skull excited great discussion; Huxley spoke of it as "the most pithecoid (ape-like) of known human skulls," and in 1864 King ventured to make it the type of new species of man, Homo neanderthalensss. The names H. primigenius and H. mousteriensis have since been applied to this race by certain German and French writers. Since this pioneer discovery numerous remains of the species have come to light and Neanderthal man is known to have ranged from the lower Rhine region to southern Spain and eastward at least to Austria. A nearly complete skull was found at Gibraltar in 1848, thus antedating the Neanderthal discovery by eight years, but it was inadequately described and its significance remained unrecognized for half a century. The more important Neanderthal remains include two skulls from Spy, Belgium, found in 1887, a large number of bones and teeth found in 1899 and later at Krapina, Austria, two nearly complete skeletons in France, namely, the old man of La Chapelle-aux-Saints, Correze (Fig. 2), and a youth from Le Moustier, Dordogne, both discovered in 1908, and three still more recent discoveries of partial skeletons, not to mention numerous jaws and teeth. The Neanderthal custom of burial in caves is largely responsible for the preservation of some of the finest of these remains. They have been found associated with various culture levels of the Palaeolithic or Old Stone Age, but chiefly identified with the flaked flints of the Mouster ian industry. It seems highly probable that a species so widely distributed endured through out a long period, possibly the greater part of the third interglacial and the fourth glacial, upwards of 100,000 years in all, and there is some reason based on differences of cranial form to suspect that the type became split up into sub-species or races. The skeletal anat omy is now well known, and much can be inferred with certainty regarding the muscles and other soft parts. They were a people of rather small stature, the men five feet three or four inches tall, of extremely robust built, with large bones, and heavily muscled. Hands and feet were large, the thighs somewhat curved forward and the knees always slightly bent. The forearm and leg are remarkably short in proportion to arm and thigh. The skull was characterized by huge size, especially great length, the low-crowned but capacious cranium marked by a projecting transverse ridge above the eyes. The orbits were cavernous, and the eyes probably deeply set, the nose very wide but prominent, not flat as in negroes. The face was of great length with some prognath ism, though the anterior teeth were nearly vertical. The cheeks sloped backward obliquely from the nose, quite unlike any modern race, and there was the merest suggestion of a chin (Fig. 2A). This huge head was supported on a very short neck, directed somewhat for ward. Altogether • the appearance of the Neanderthal was such as to suggest the ad jective °bestial° and admirably fulfils the popular conception of a brutal, low-browed cave man. Regarding such superficial features as complexion and hair, of course nothing is known. A few ethnologists regard the Neander thals as a degenerate type. As to culture, we know that he flaked the flint implements of the Mousterian phase (probably also the still earlier Acheulean and even Chellean), of which one characteristic form is the "coup de poing° or fist-hatchet, and others are obviously for cut ting up game, scraping skins, etc. The charred bones found about the rock-shelters of the limestone cliffs show that he possessed the art of making fire and that he roasted the flesh of the wild horse, wild ox and reindeer. Several of the skeletons had been carefully buried, to gether with stone implements and parts of game animals, a practice usually considered to indicate some idea of post-mortem existence. As to the origin of the Neanderthals, it has usually been supposed that they migrated into Europe from Asia, but the recent discovery of the earlier and more primitive but somewhat similar Heidelberg man, suggests that the Neanderthals may have evolved in Europe. Before the end of the fourth and last glacial phase, the species seems to have become extinct, and to have been replaced rather suddenly by at least two races of Homo sapiens, early repre sentatives of our own species, but the relation of the Neanderthal to these higher types, and whether or not he has any share in the ancestry of modern Europeans, is still questionable. The weight of opinion seems to favor the view that he was exterminated by higher immigrant races, but in such cases there is usually some crossing and no less an authority than Hrdliaca believes that slight traces of Neanderthal blood are still discernible in certain regions of Europe.
Among the successors of Neanderthal man, and possibly contemporaneous with him dur ing the later centuries of his epoch, was the highly developed race first known from several skeletons discovered in 1868 in a grotto at Cr& Magnon, near Les Eyzies, Dordogne, and named from the site of discovery the Cro-Magnon race. The half century since has witnessed a considerable accumulation of data relative to the physical features, distribution and culture of this people. In many characters the Cro Magnon men closely approximate certain modern types. The head form is dolichoce phalic, with vertical forehead, prominent nar row nose and strong chin (Figs. 3 and 3A). The orbits are low and elongate transversely; the cheek-bones very wide in proportion to the cranial form. The skeletons from certain sta tions are of great height, over six feet, but others, apparently of the same race, are much shorter, and the women seem to have been much smaller than the men. In general this race had well-formed heads and fine physiques. Plainly, the Cro-Magnons are of our own species, Homo sapiens, and their likeness to certain modern types in southwestern Europe suggests that a strong strain of the blood of this ancient race still exists. Verneau has also adduced evidence for the belief that the Guanches, the aborigines of the Canary Islands, were of this stock. One or two recent writers have asserted that the CrO-Magnons show negroid affinities, but ex cept for the relative proportions of the limb bones, the evidence is all opposed to this view. The race appears so suddenly and is so different physically from the Neanderthal as to preclude descent from the latter ; hence it is generally believed to have migrated from Asia. In early postglacial time the CrO-Magnons attained a wide distribution in western Europe, their range closely approximating that of their more primitive predecessors. In a number of locali ties remains have been found associated with rich cultural data, and the race is identified with those late phases of the Old Stone. Age known as Aurignacian, Solutrean and Magdalenian, characterized by a great variety of flint im plements, knives, spear-heads, chisels, borers, scrapers, etc., of delicate workmanship, and tools of bone and antler such as needles, spear throwers and harpoons, as well as incised draw ings on reindeer antler, mammoth tusk and stone depicting the great mammals which still sur vived — the mammoth, wooly rhinoceros, wild horse, reindeer, lion and others. The CrO Magnons were a race of troglodytes, more truly cave men than were the Neanderthals, and to this race belonged the mural artists whose brilliant polychrome paintings of contemporary animals still adorn the walls and roofs of caverns in southern France and northern Spain. Ceremonial burial of the dead was practised and some of the burials show that ornaments were worn. Clothing, doubtless of skins, is in dicated by the bone needles. On the whole, these people had attained a considerable degree of culture, but there is no evidence that they practised agriculture, or kept herds, or that they had achieved the domestic arts of pottery or weaving. They were a race of hunters, ap parently with more or less fixed abodes and some organized social structure. Geological evidence indicates that the early postglacial period, during which the Cro-Magnons flour ished, was some 10,000 to 20,000 years ago. It seems improbable that this race was extermi nated; it is more likely that it became inter mingled with other immigrant stocks, progeni tors of Neolithic men, and there are indica tions that a Cro-Magnon strain still persists in the population of certain localities in France.
A considerable number of skeletal remains of late Pleistocene Age have come to light in Europe, some of which are doubtfully to be assigned to the Cro-Magnon race (e.g., those of Engis and Combe-Capelle) while others, not ably the Briinn and Galley Hill crania, seem to belong to a different physical type, but clearly Homo sapiens. In 1906 a surprising discovery was made in one of the caves in southern France which had previously yielded several CrO-Magnon skeletons. This was the disinter ment, from a slightly lower level, of two skeletons, a woman and a youth (Fig. 71, which strikingly resemble certain negroid types, especially the South African Bushmen. The name Grimaldi race has been given to these ancient negroids, but it is impossible, as yet, to account for the origin of the race except to say that they were early postglacial immigrants. It is significant that several small sculptured statuettes from France, and one from Austria, appear to represent female negroid types in whom certain physical features are exaggerated as in Bushmen women. Presumably these are the handiwork of the Grimaldi negroid race. These discoveries are important as demonstrat ing the early diffentiation of a negreid stock, and they suggest interesting questions as to its prehistoric migrations.