. The evolution of the dragon. important, because, upon the same stratum as the skeletonwith which they were associated, was found part of a Cassis rufa^a shell whose habitat does not extend any nearer than the IndianOcean.^ These facts are very important. In the first place they reveal thegreat antiquity of the practice of burying shells with the dead, pre-sumably for the purpose of life-giving . Secondly, they suggest thepossibility that their magical value as givers of life may be more ancientthan their specific use as intensifiers of the fertility of women. Thirdly,the association of these
. The evolution of the dragon. important, because, upon the same stratum as the skeletonwith which they were associated, was found part of a Cassis rufa^a shell whose habitat does not extend any nearer than the IndianOcean.^ These facts are very important. In the first place they reveal thegreat antiquity of the practice of burying shells with the dead, pre-sumably for the purpose of life-giving . Secondly, they suggest thepossibility that their magical value as givers of life may be more ancientthan their specific use as intensifiers of the fertility of women. Thirdly,the association of these practices with the use of the shell Cassis rufaindicates a very early cultural contact between the people living uponthe North-Western shores of the Mediterranean in the Reindeer Ageand the dwellers on the coasts of the Indian Ocean ; and the proba- ^ Chapter I. The literature relating to these important discoveries has been sum-marized by Wilfrid Jackson in his Shells as Evidence of the Migrations ofEarly Culture, pp.
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, booksubjectdragons, booksubjectm
