tag="{http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml}a">[14]

A considerable number of skulls and skeletons, about two dozen in all, of Neanderthal man have been found, the great majority in Celtic lands; but, though there is a general resemblance between all the members of the series, sufficiently strong to mark them off from the Piltdown skull on the one hand and from modern men on the other, the type is in many respects very variable. There are vast differences observable between the skull from Chapelle-aux-Saints,[15] the highest form yet discovered, and that of the Gibraltar man,[16] or rather woman, which is the most primitive yet found in Europe. As far as one can judge from the descriptions which have appeared as I write, the skull recently found at Broken Hill in Rhodesia differs from that of Gibraltar hardly if at all more than the Gibraltar skull differs from that found at Chapelle-aux-Saints. In the latter case there are several intermediate forms, in the former such may yet turn up, for Africa has, as yet, produced but one other skull of this type, that found not long ago near Constantine in Algeria, no description of which has, I believe, yet been published.

Skulls of this type have been so frequently described,[17] individually and collectively, that it is unnecessary to give another detailed account. It will be sufficient to say that they are large and massive, the vault is low, and they are specially distinguished by having over the eye sockets a heavy and continuous projecting ridge, known as a torus, which is one of the distinguishing features of the large anthropoid apes. Another point of importance is that the head was so attached to the body that it could not have been held absolutely erect, and must have produced a slouching gait, though the degree of this slope varied considerably in different specimens, and in the case of the Rhodesian skull was quite halfway between the slope of the Gibraltar skull and that of the gorilla.[18]

But it is unnecessary for our purpose to pursue this question further, for with the arrival of modern man, after the last glaciation was past, Neanderthal man disappeared. That the two races met, though not necessarily in this continent, seems clear from the fact that at Audi, near Les Eyzies, in the Dordogne, we find a culture, which in some respects resembles that of Le Moustier, and in others the succeeding culture of Aurignac.[19] That these two races interbred is unlikely, for Neanderthal man must have appeared an unsightly beast to his modern successor. In any case, if mating did take place, the union must have been sterile, for, in spite of much that has been written to the contrary,[20], there is no clear evidence of the survival of any distinctive Neanderthal traits in the men of later days.[21]

The second maximum of the Würm glaciation seems to have culminated about 15,000 B.C.,[22] and about that time, or conceivably earlier, modern man first arrived in North Africa, if we may judge by the appearance of a fresh type of flint industry, known usually as Capsian.[23] Whence he came is uncertain. It has been suggested that he may have reached the north from tropical Africa,[24] but no evidence has been adduced in support of this hypothesis. It seems more likely that he came from Asia, probably by means of the Sinaitic peninsula, or possibly across the Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb. This much is certain; about this time the Capsian culture is found extending along the north of the continent, from Egypt as far west at any rate as Algeria, and perhaps beyond, though at no point but one is it found far from the Mediterranean coast.[25] The one exception is in Egypt, where implements of this type have been found as far south as Luxor,[26] so that we may be satisfied that modern man in his earliest movements passed up the Nile valley at least as far as the First Cataract. It would seem probable that in Egypt the invaders came into touch with their Neanderthal predecessors, who retreated before them up the Nile valley towards Luxor, where Dr. Seligman has found implements of Le Moustier type more developed than any discovered elsewhere[27]; it is possible that some retreated further south and may even have reached Rhodesia.

Other of these Neanderthal refugees seem to have gone westward, and perhaps passed up the Italian land-bridge to western Europe; if so it was probably these, who had come into contact with the Capsian culture of North Africa, who were responsible for the Audi industry. They were followed before long by the invaders, and in Celtic lands at least were soon exterminated, though it is just possible that they survived to a later date further east.[28]

The culture of the newcomers is known as that of Aurignac, and seems to have started in Europe about 12,500 B.C. A great many skeletons of this period have been discovered and described, and though all of these show us men very like those of the present day, there is a considerable range of variation among them.[29] The skulls of the upper palæolithic periods,