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Show II Very : j ' S I Creditable j Mural Prehistoric Artists Dec- H orating Their Cavern I Ul Fllll I Henry Fairfield dsborn, H r-y -m j J&t ' .. . . Just Completed for the H ' LOiOrS, : AmeWcan Mu.,eum of I Our Cave !.-; I 1:1 Dwelling S I Prehistoric ' .. J I I v ' aMMHH 'iWi m? 1 p I fHE Hall or the Ago of Man. a 3 most interesting department of agr the American Museum of Nat- jl aval History, New York, is now an- Jm proacliing completion. yj This hall, by means of models and fl pictures, presents a complete view of the various stages in the cvolu- How tion of man, as well as of the . hH , ,i Women animal? that Burround him. in yore the infancy of li a development , . in v.irio'i-: part.- ni' ilic woiM. . . Perhaps the most' singular fact lar.!r' about prehistoric man shown i, ir here is the high degree of a; lis- u C tic ability which ho displayed. Homcs' Tt is amazing to find that men B living 60,000 rears ago, and even more, Hr could make life-like pictures of animals and natural scenes that compare credit-ably credit-ably with the work of some of our ablest. Bl mode martial For example, tliere is a mural painting in the American Museum which shows the meu of the Cro-Magnon period in France, who lived probably 60,000 jca'rs ago, deco-rating deco-rating the walls cf their cave In the fc dogce district The wall painting which the prehistoric artists arc finishing (a an exact reproduction of a prehistoric paint; Ing actually found in a cave in Bordpgne : The prehistoric painting shows a group : of gigantic hairy mammoths who lived at the same time as (he artists and must have been one ot the most exciting feu-tures feu-tures of their existence. This picture, executed very realistically in colors, thero- - fore gives us a very characteristic sccno of life in that early time and correspond to what an American artist might seek to portray in decorating the walls of a public building in these days. The prehistoric wall painting may be Yj compared. lor instance, with the mural Jj painting executed by Mr. E. H. Blashlleld I for the court house at Wilkesbarro. U Pa The artist is one of the best Hj known of contemporary mural M painters, and in this work he ll symbolizes the relation of the jaw couri to our American lite. He is our ' counterpart of the cave-painter and, Grange to say, the difference In artistic ability shown is not as great as might bo expected. When Mr. Blashfleld'8 attention was J called to this matter he was not at all' ofTended at the suggestion that he might H be compared with a prehistoric cave Hj j painter, and he furnished this interesting K comment : "There docs not seem to be any such thing iij, absolute aud consecutive progress in art. There are vaiiations in differeut 1 periods, and in each period there is new j progress, but only along lines upon which ! .attention has been newly concentrated, j "The Greek artists. 2 .000 years aeo ; reached higher points than any other-art- 1 1 isi; so did the mediaeval artist, the renali nance artist, the modern artist, each In b I ! turn. But the artists of each epoch reached the highest point in certain quali ties only at the cost of losing or Ignoring certain other qualities which artists of other epoojis developed to a hi her degree, j "In a word or two, modern art reaches higher points in certain directions than B any earlier art. In certain other direc- Hi lions early art reaches points which no H modern art attains." H Of course, these cave men were rough 1 and uncultivated In other respects. They H j had little social organization, as we un H I deretand It to-day, they had no govern- 1 raent, no army, no universities; they had jg little knowledge of the mechanical i B In fact, they lacked most of the thing thai 9 we regard as making up I ivlllzatlon. They H had no agriculture and lived by hunting '3 and fishln-. B nG cave must have been a kind of art Jx school, where many of the tribe stayed at home and learned to paint. This leads to Mural Painting of Justice in the Wilke?-Barri9 (Pa.) Courthouse, by Mr. E. H. Blashfield, H if Probably the Forcviost Mural Painter of 1 ' f the Day. Copyright by Mr. Blashfield. U ' ' A Remarkably Remark-ably Fine It 1 M u r a 1 Painting in Full Colors of an Ancient Bison Found on the Ceiling of a Cave in France. the reflection that tl;e hunting and fihintf members of the tribe umt have been willing will-ing to g1i- up a large share of their hard-won hard-won game and other spoils in order to support the artists at their reftned occupation. occu-pation. Evidently the cave men, while they may have been "low brows " in most respects, were "high brows" in regard to art. The artistic excellence attained by the cave men raises many important points concerning tie doctrine of evolution. These people appear to have suddenly come iilto existence. Tliere Js no re ord of along line of ancestor-, .slowly working up to thla proncieucy In art. Did man evolve by slow stages from his animal Btajte, or did he evolve by sudden Jumps at widely separated times and places? This is a great question, which i. not yet settled, but which the remains of the cave men may help to clear up. In order to understand ju-t how advanced ad-vanced these cave men were it is desirable desir-able to have the opinion vjf an expert. Professor Henry Fairfield Osborn, director of the American Mu-eum. describing this phase of eavly life, says: "C o n t emp o rane-OUBly rane-OUBly with the disappearance disap-pearance of the last glacial period in Europe a highly evolved race, in no respect inferior to modern man. entered that continent from the Kaf nml rlrnvn out or exterminated th Neanderthal race, of which they were both the mental and physical H'iperiors. "Their cultural capacity la indicated not alone by the ir physiognomy and -the cubic content of their brain, but has also been demonstrated by the handiwork and e-pecially e-pecially the artistic productions which they have left in the caves of Southern Europe. The Palaeolithic murals and sculptural in relief painted on the walls of limestone grottoes in Franco and Spain indicate greater artistic sense and ability than hav been found among any other uncivilized people." The painting made uy U. It- Knight for the Hall of the Age of Man represents four Cro.Magnon artists at work on the famous proee-sion of mammoths which was found In the cave of Font-de-tSaume, In Durdogne. Two haH-kneeling Rgures aro holding lamps made of hollowed out stones to enable the artists to see clearly in the dimnefc.s of the cave. One artist, who is bending over la engaged in Incising the outlines of the mammoth on the limestone lime-stone wall with a sharp flint; the other (Ci 1900. International Featurr Scrxl ac. 4 wfj1 ' - artist is laylnjr on the colors, employing a shoulder bone an a pallet. The man sitting sit-ting down i preparing colors from red and yellow ochre. The man standing up, with a staff, is a rhlftain. who fakes care that the artists do their day'.i work and receive their feed. Everybody should visit the Hall of the ge of Man and see the various steps by Which his ancestors emerged from the brute stage. The ancestry of man la held to have begun in Asia two million years or more ago. He is descended from an app like creature, not positively identified. identi-fied. There is In the hall a Jaw of a rare fossil animal called the "Prnpliopithccwr." which may Iistp been an ancestor of both man and the existing ape We can lock at a reproduction of the very early "Pithecanthropus." found In liva which is neither distinctly an apo nor distinctly human. A. collection of th great man apes enables en-ables one lo see the exact differences be-tv.eon be-tv.eon men and apes. The earliest known positively human reltc is the Jaw of the FIeid,elber? man a il -vhi'i) - believed to be 2"..0K' yenr old. The Heidelberg man may have been the ancestor of the Neanderthal race which was widely spread In Kurope over a hundred thousand years ago. The Museum Mu-seum possesses the actual remains of a Neanderthal man, found at Krapiua. Along with the Neanderthal man in Kuror.e lived herds rf woolly rhinoceros", nnd woolly mammoths. The Neanderthals were conquered and largely exterminate.! by the 'm-Magnon . race, who entered from life East and who?e artistic work excites so much ln- C.-eat Britain Rirht? F.fjfrred. 4 Exfcemely Creditable Fresco Representing a Prehistoric Stag Hunt, Painted in Dark Red by Paleolithic Artists. taresl The contrast between the Cro-Magnon Cro-Magnon heads and those of the Nfandor-thals Nfandor-thals i very wide, a.s' the former are nearly like those of tho Caucasian race today. to-day. The Cro-Magnons were displaced by the Neolithic, or "New Stono" race, who showed lower Intelligence and artistic ability, but greater combative force. The new race, which is considered the ancestor of the most warlike nations of to-day, was chiefly concerned, in a rigorou? northern limate. with the strugg! for existence ex-istence in which the qualities of endurance, endur-ance, tribal loyalty and (he rudiments of family life were being cultivated. Etude lm!- took the place of caverns and shelters, shel-ters, which were now mostly abandoned. These conquerors were tali men, with high, irajTOW "Nulls, related to thp existing Nordic race, more powerful In build than he people of the Swis Lake Dwellings. Skulls and skeletons representative of this lirdy northern type are abundantly known in Scandinavia, but have not found their way lo the American Museum collections as yet. The Hall of the Age of Man is planned to contain four chief collections of the mammals of the world during man's existence. ex-istence. In Europe prehistoric man hunted the . reindeer, the wild horse and cattle and the mammoth. He used the hide of the reindeer for clothing, the flesh and marrow or food. He carved the ivory tusks of the An Artist of the Cave Dwelling Days, as Reconstructed and Modeled Mod-eled by Modern Scientists. mammoth. The mammoth, the northern, IH hairy type of elephant, known to early ex- BflK idorors of for-sll remains, was foremost among the great mammals hunted by man. B T!ic whole history of this animal famliy is M s'lown in the TIall of the Aero of Man. 'Bl The evolution of the elephantine animals kfl or proboscideans culminates in the masto- dons and mammoths. This is one of tho romances of evolution quite equal in inter- est to the evolution of the horse. This col- k action is by far the most complete in ex- Istenee; It contains as much in the way of complete skeletons as those In all the other museums of the world combined. The early strides in the evolution of the proboscid- L!H cans, beginning with tho Palaeomastodon 11 discovered iiuhe Fayum region of northern Africa, carry us back into times far ante cedent to the Age of Man, namely, into an early period of the Age of Mammals, tho HH Oligocone. il Four great murals Just completed on tho .y north walls show Mfe In y tho Glacial epoch in Die J Northern Hemisphere). kM They represent the final vm glacial stage, the period ASj e lH of the glaciers over the B entire Northern Heml- , W sphere, of the most in- f Pfe ol tnamnal , f time of rne Cro-Sfanon j i '.'v, and our knowledge en me luauinioius, rein- &JH deer r.nd rhinoceroses is derived from tho actual mM Cro-Magnon painting and etchings, chiefiv tbo.o found within the caverns The woolly rhinoceros, like the woolly mammoth, was Iviavilv enwrapped In hall beneath which was a thick coat of fin wool. A th thh protect!,,,, , . animal wa q.nte Indifferent foathe wintry blasts which swept ovr the steppe-like country of northern France. This goMen-brown wool is actually preserved on the side of the far? of one specimen discovered, which is ol Petrom A r, , A bead of the rhinoceros was long and I rhinoceros of M ;Vr"' $ tfc" Jay vore narrow r and . I theuppei lips more pointed i ! - inlmal quite distinct from the great black V rhinoceros still extant In Africa, which l3 WM a srazer with broad Hps. 3 One mural painting represents two herds : . "l "M moth, mi jraUng alone 1 - banks of the river Somme, not t i ;oni one Pf the great encampment, or men "f the ( rr, MKn?h, rae0. These reinSS IP muI mammoths are. in fact, depicted xttv L M Pmtlnga end engraviSJ W Cro-Magnon artists-,..,. S triki,)K fact that in the case of the mam moth every painting, drawing. etcffnfSS F model hich the Cro-Magnon i man fill W g Ten us exhibits exactly The mlu B actera- the long hairy eoverin"?he var? I high hum;, above the forehead tha W between the hump and the neck tL ver I I |