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                THE LAKE-DWELLINGS OF EUROPE.




                The LAKE-DWELLINGS of EUROPE:

       BEING THE _RHIND LECTURES IN ARCHÆOLOGY for 1888_.

                 BY ROBERT MUNRO, M.A., M.D.,

  SECRETARY OF THE SOCIETY OF ANTIQUARIES OF SCOTLAND; AUTHOR OF
          "ANCIENT SCOTTISH LAKE-DWELLINGS OR CRANNOGS."

                   CASSELL & COMPANY, LIMITED:

                _LONDON, PARIS & MELBOURNE_. 1890.

                    [ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.]


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   indicate =bold= in the original text.
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PREFACE.


The Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, in offering me the Rhind
lectureship in Archæology for the year 1888, left me no choice of a
subject, as they had already suggested that the course should be on
the "Lake-dwellings of Europe." Their communication embodying this
proposal came upon me with complete surprise, and, indeed, it was with
considerable misgiving that I pondered over the undertaking, because
at that time I had no special knowledge of lake-dwellings beyond
Scotland. But the kind encouragement of friends and the fact that I
had two years to collect the necessary materials, ultimately overcame
my scruples; and so with the acceptance of this appointment the work
now offered to the public may be said to have been begun. My first
and almost immediate step was a hasty run to the principal centres of
lake-dwelling researches in Europe, so as to get a preliminary idea
of the best and most practical way of carrying out this work. It was
only then that the magnitude of the labours I had undertaken dawned
upon me. The relics from the more important settlements, with few
exceptions, were so widely scattered that, to form an intelligible
notion of the civilisation and culture of their inhabitants from a
study of their industrial remains, scores of museums and private
collections had to be visited. Nor was the condition of the literature
and records of the various discoveries more favourable to my purpose.
The successive investigations by different parties in the more
prolific stations were constantly altering the previous records and,
in some instances, even falsified the earlier deductions founded on
them. Again, descriptive notices were directed more to illustrate
the particular and rarer finds of the investigator than to convey to
general readers a fair estimate of the _tout-ensemble_ of any special
station. Keller's earlier reports were really exhaustive monographs,
but by-and-by the subject became so extensive that to carry out the
work on the same scale would entail the publication of many volumes.
In 1866, when Mr. Lee translated and arranged Keller's first six
reports, his work was fairly representative of the progress then made
in lake-dwelling researches; but to keep pace with this progress
a second edition at the end of the following decade assumed the
magnitude of two large volumes.

Since then, however (1878), the results of lacustrine researches have
been greater and more important than during any previous corresponding
period. The "Correction des Eaux du Jura," together with various
harbour alterations in the lakes of Zürich, Geneva, etc., have
been the means of enormously increasing the lacustrine collections
of Switzerland. In North Italy not only have new and remarkably
interesting lacustrine stations been discovered and exhaustively
investigated, as Lagozza and Polada, but the researches in the
terremare have been such as to entirely alter the previous opinions
held in regard to them. Nor has the progress in this field of research
in many other countries in Europe been scarcely less important, in
proof of which I have only to mention the additions made to the
Scottish and Irish crannogs; the curious fascine structures brought
to light in Holderness, Yorkshire; the novel revelations extracted
from the _terp_ mounds in Holland and other low-lying districts on
the coast of the German Ocean; the greatly extended and more accurate
details of lacustrine structures in North Germany; the discovery in
Hungary of prehistoric mounds analogous to the terramara deposits of
Italy, etc. In short there is hardly any corner of the lake-dwelling
area in Europe which has not yielded new materials, throwing more or
less light on this strange phase of prehistoric life.

In these circumstances I resolved to proceed _de novo_, and to
construct my story of the lake-dwellings from whatever trustworthy
sources I could lay my hands on. In order to carry out this intention
my wife and I perambulated the whole of Central Europe with note and
sketch books in hand, visiting, as far as practicable, the sites
of lake-dwellings, and searching museums and libraries wherever we
thought their relics or records were to be found. The eastern limit
of the region thus visited may be represented by a line drawn from
Königsberg to Trieste, passing through the intermediate towns of
Krakow, Buda-Pesth, and Agram. The materials brought together from
within this area are, to a very considerable extent, absolutely new
to British archæologists. Of course, in a work which aims at putting
into the hands of general readers an epitome of the essential facts
and results of lacustrine researches since these singular remains were
discovered in Europe, I had to take cognisance of some investigations
that have already been fully recorded and illustrated. As it was
