breed was established not later than towards the end of the oldest settlement of the North Kurgan; that is, according to my chronology, about 6000 B. c. It was formed during the part of the climatic cycle in which prevailed those conditions, unfavorable to nutrition, to which the breed owed its stunted character. Its characteristic features became firmly fixed during the subsequent existence of many generations after transference to a nomadic life on the arid plains during the dry extreme of the cycle. And the firm establishment of the characteristics of the breed is proved by its persistence down to the present time, for it still exists at one point in the high Alps of the Grisons in Switzerland, and in Wales.
These domestic animals make their appearance in European neolithic stations apparently contemporaneously with an immigration of a people of a round-headed Asiatic type which seems to have infiltrated gradually among the prevailing long-headed Europeans. The presumption is, therefore, that these animals were brought from Asia by this round-headed people, and that we have in this immigration one of the earliest, indeed probably the earliest, postglacial factor in the problem of Asiatic influence in European racial as well as cultural origins, for they brought with them both the art of cattle-breeding and some knowledge of agriculture.
While, however, the ultimate Transcaspian origin of these domesticated animals and of the wheat and barley, and probably of the accompanying round-headed people as well, may be considered as practically assured, it is a noteworthy fact that we look in vain among the finds from the Swiss lake-dwellings and other neolithic stations of Central Europe for objects that recall the industrial culture of the primitive Transcaspian oasis towns. It is possible that the spindle-whorl and the art of spinning may have been brought to Europe with the arts of breeding and of agriculture. But aside from these the industrial products present in the main no Central-Asiatic suggestions. Instead of these we find only the evidences of the most-developed European neolithic culture with its store of finely wrought stone implements and characteristic primitive European pottery. This remarkable absence of traditions of the advanced industrial arts of the Transcaspian oasis towns seemed difficult to explain, if we should assume that the domestic animals and cereals were brought to Europe by the descendants of the oasis people who originated them, for we should not expect such acquirements to be lost, but rather to find them added to those of the local cultures.
It was not until May, 1907, that the basis of an explanation was discovered, when Professor Sergi of Rome kindly examined a series of skulls which I had submitted to him at his suggestion, including two of adults who had not been formally buried. These skulls had been sent to America by Mr. Langdon Warner, who had been intrusted by Dr. Schmidt with the uncovering and recording of the skeletons of children encountered during our excavations. They were all inscribed at the time of discovery with the exact vertical and horizontal position in the kurgan strata, and they ranged from the oldest layers of the North Kurgan through the first and second cultures to the top of the kurgan. As the reader will observe by referring to Professor Sergi's report, they'are all dolichocephalic or ynesocephalic,
IIIFカラー高解像度
