Full resolution (TIFF) - On this page / på denna sida - I. Prehistoric Times - A. The Stone Age
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The Stone Age 3
in a field near Alvastra, which at that time was a shal-
low arm of a lake. Here have been found remains of
a large raft of logs, and brushwood, which people more
than four thousand years ago pushed out some three
hundred feet into the marsh. On this artificial island
they found protection against enemies and wild beasts.
For whoever attempted to approach the place would
sink helplessly into the mire, and the water was too
shallow for the use of boats. Only on footbridges could
any one reach the huts. Such bridges could readily be
taken up at night, or upon the approach of an enemy.
Remains of such bridges have actually been found near
Alvastra.
In the same layers archaeologists have also found re-
mains of utensils, tools, and weapons of stone as well
as offals or leavings from meals. From the latter, one
may learn what sort of animals, tame and wild, the
stone-age people lived on and hunted. Thus have been
found the bones of four kinds of wild animals, now
extinct in Sweden : the wild boar, the aurochs, the wild
cat, and the beaver. From the hard and tough bones of
the wild cat excellent bodkins were formed, and the
long and sharp tusks of the beaver furnished splendid
chisels.
On this artificial island, then, the people erected
their huts, made of a framework of poles intertwined
with twigs or reeds and plastered with mud or covered
with sod. Near the shores of many of the lakes in
central Europe remains of similar villages have been
found. The huts have, however, been built, not on
rafts, but on piles driven into the bottom of the shal-
low waters.
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