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The average index is 75.27, and the majority of the indices lay within a few units of that number. Ten skulls from Halsaflieni in Malta have cephalic indices running from 66 to 75.1, the average being 71.84. Of a series of 44 skulls from the rock-tombs of the Petit Morin in France, 12 had an index of over 80, 22 were between 75 and 80, and 10 were below 75.
In one of them was found a cow's horn. Their purpose is unknown, but similar pairs of pits occur elsewhere at Halsaflieni. In two of the largest chambers in the hypogeum the roof and walls are still decorated with designs in red paint. The patterns consist of graceful combinations of curved lines and spirals.
This, however, does not explain the presence of burials in the chapel itself, and it is far more likely that it was only after Halsaflieni had ceased to be used for its original purpose that it was seized upon as a convenient place for burial. The question of the date of the Maltese megalithic buildings is a difficult one.
Finally Halsaflieni has yielded several steatopygous figurines. Some of these resemble those of Hagiar Kim, but two are of rather different type. Each of these represents a female lying on a rather low couch. In the better preserved of the two she lies on her right side, her head on a small uncomfortable-looking pillow.
At Halsaflieni, in Malta, we have perhaps examples of the curious custom of secondary interment; the body is buried temporarily in some suitable place, and after the flesh has left the bones the latter are collected and thrown together into a common ossuary. The custom was not unknown in neolithic days, especially in Crete.
In other words, Halsaflieni was used as a burial place, though this may not have been its original purpose. The bones lay for the most part in disorder, and so thickly that in a space of about 4 cubic yards lay the remains of no less than 120 individuals. One skeleton, however, was found intact, lying on the right side in the crouched position, i.e. with arms and knees bent up.
In the village of Casal Paula, which lies about a mile from the head of the Grand Harbour of Valletta, is a wonderful complex of subterranean chambers known as the Hypogeum of Halsaflieni, which may justly be considered as one of the wonders of the world.
The finest instance of this is the Halsaflieni hypogeum in Malta, where the solid rock is hewn out with infinite care to imitate the form and even the details of surface building. Similarly we have seen that both in Sardinia and in France the same forms of tomb were rendered in great stones or in solid rock almost indifferently.
No doubt the skins of the animals they domesticated and of those they hunted provided them with some form of covering, at any rate in countries where it was needed. Possibly they spun wool or flax into a thread, for at Halsaflieni two objects were found which look like spindle-whorls, and others occur on sites which are almost certainly to be attributed to the megalithic people.
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