Ouatrefages, who had previously held that anteriority in point of development must be assigned to the brachycephalic races, thus writes of the Crenelle skeletons :—
"The old beds of the Seine, studied with remarkable intelligence by M. Belgrand, have furnished us with a relative chronometer, the indications of which have been fully appreciated by M. Hamy. The work presented by him at the Stockholm Congress (p. 772) leaves no room for doubt. Till the present time the dolichocephalic type only has been found in the lowest gravels of the plain of Crenelle. It is therefore represented by the Canstadt race. It reappears in the form of the Cro-Magnon race, in the alluvial beds at the level of and below the erratic blocks at a depth of 3 to 4 metres. Skulls which approach more or less to the brachycephalic type are only found above this level at a depth of from 2.50 metres to 1.40 metres. The superposition, and consequently the succession of types, is here evident. Does this authorise us to consider the dolichocephalic type as having everywhere preceded the brachycephalic ? We ought perhaps still to retain some doubts on this point. Some fragments, belonging probably to the latter, have been discovered at Clichy, very little above a cranial vault of the Canstadt race, and the beautiful skull from Nagysap in Hungary was obtained from a well-characterised loess, the age of which, however, does not appear to have been determined." (Human Species, p. 299.)
Clichy Skeleton.
In 1868 M. E. Bertrand notified, at the Anthropological Society of Paris, the finding of portions of a human skeleton in ancient gravels of the Seine at Clichy, at a depth of 5.45 metres. The human bones were enclosed in a confined space along with those of elephant, ox, horse, and stag. Those of the elephant were discoloured by a reddish substance, believed to have been derived from an upper stratum in which they were originally embedded ; while the associated animals' bones were of a whitish colour, and represented individual bones of different species. M. de Mortillet maintains that the discoverer, on visiting the gravel quarry in the absence of the workmen, came upon a concealed hoard which one of the latter had laid aside till such time as a purchaser turned up. Of course, there was a controversy over the matter, but, as Cartailhac remarks, it ended by each controversialist holding his own opinion.
The skull, according to M. Hamy, was nearly complete, except the frontal portion, but sufficient remained to determine the cephalic index to be 67 or 68. Some distance higher up another skull was disinterred which belonged to the "groupe
