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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.
There are many other rock-tombs of smaller size but similar plan and decoration in the district round the central site, and others which show reliefs of human figures and of lions, the latter of immense proportions on two famous facades.
It may be that early rock-tombs will yet be found in North Africa, but it seems improbable that, had they existed in the British Isles, in North Germany, or in Scandinavia, not a single example should have been found.
The most important cemeteries of this period are those of Castelluccio, Melilli, and Monteracello. Near this last site was also found a round hut based on a course of orthostatic slabs of typically megalithic appearance. In the full bronze age, called the Second Siculan Period, burial in rock-tombs still remained the rule. The tomb-form had developed considerably.
In France, for instance, the sculptured rock-tombs of the valley of the Petit Morin show, some a human figure, some an axe, and some a combination of the two. This same juxtaposition of the two also occurs on a slab which closed the top of a corbelled chamber at Collorgues in Gard. A simple allée couverte at Göhlitzsch in Saxony has on one of its blocks an axe and handle engraved and coloured red.
This is ornamented on each side of the entrance of the tomb with four pilasters cut in relief in the solid rock, each pair being connected by a semicircular arch also in relief. On the pilasters is incised a pattern of circles and V-shaped signs. A somewhat similar arrangement of pilasters is seen in two rock-tombs at Cava Lavinaro in the same district.
Many a time have I seen the souls of the dead fluttering and wheeling and screaming above the old mausoleums, and rock-tombs of ancient times.
How many of these rock-tombs were made here will probably never be known, but year by year more are uncovered. The first we step into is like a large well-lighted cave cut out of a cliff-side, from it opens another cave-like room, and from that another, each sloping downward and the whole series giving the impression of a series of puzzle-boxes fitting into one another and then drawn out.
The abnormal orientation was here clearly determined by the desire to make use of the face of rock in the construction. The naus seem to have been tombs, as human remains have been found in them. Rock-tombs also occur in the islands. The most remarkable are those of S. Vincent in Majorca. Prehistoric villages surrounded by great stone walls can still be traced in the Balearic Isles.
The remainder of the Persian royal sepulchres are rock-tombs, excavations in the sides of mountains, generally at a considerable elevation, so placed as to attract the eye of the beholder, while they are extremely difficult of approach.
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