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We do not know how early cremation was introduced in Gaul; we can only say that Caesar found it generally practised when be made his triumphal march across the country. The celebrated excavations of Moreau prove that inhumation and incineration were both practised among the Gallo-Romans established in the eastern provinces of France.
The difficulties of inhumation are capable of such variety as causes us already to foresee that the Necrophorus cannot employ fixed methods in the accomplishment of his labours. Exposed to fortuitous hazards, he must be able to modify his tactics within the limits of his modest perceptions.
By INHUMATION in pits, graves, holes in the ground, mounds; cists, and caves. 2d. By CREMATION, generally on the surface of the earth, occasionally beneath, the resulting bones or ashes being placed in pits, in the ground, in boxes placed on scaffolds or trees, in urns, sometimes scattered. 3d.
That seems as certain as anything in prehistoric times can be, unless we are to say, that after the age of shaft graves and spirit worship came an age of cremation and of no spirit worship; and that late poets consciously and conscientiously preserved the tradition of this period into their own ages of hero worship and inhumation, though they did not preserve the tradition of the shaft-grave period.
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