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infinite remoteness. But it is at any rate noteworthy that the inme designs, patterns and even games are found in ancient Mexico and in India or China; and whether these resemblances arise from relations between the peoples using them or from accident, is a problem well worth investigation.

In countries like Scandinavia or Switzerland, the story of the early ages is clear and comparatively free from complications. The one by its remoteness was left to develop with but little help from the rest of Europe up to historical times; the other, protected on so many sides by its mountain ranges, seems to have enjoyed a peaceful existence during the Stone and Bronze Ages. A community of fishermen and agriculturists, they led a calm domestic life on the edges of their many lakes where they constructed dwellings on piles with only a gangway to the shore, to prevent the attacks of predatory animals. The practice of building houses in lakes was a common one not only in Switzerland, but also in Britain and in Ireland, as in modern times among the natives of New Guinea. Besides securing the safety of the inhabitants, it had the not unimportant advantage of being more healthy; all refuse of food and other useless matter could at once be thrown into the water where it would be harmless. A similar form of dwelling is the Irish "crannog," constructed on an island or shoal in a lake, in some cases artificially heightened so as to bring it above water. These crannogs were probably inhabited in Ireland up to comparatively recent times, if one may judge by the remains found on the sites.

Among the most notable and obvious relics of pre-historic times, both in Britain and in many other countries such as Spain, Portugal, France and even India, are gigantic circles Stone Age and avenues of stone and dolmens (see STONE MONU- relics. MENTS). These enduring monuments have excited the wonder of countless generations, and lent themselves to superstitious practices down to modern times. But the precise purpose for which they were erected and even the period to which they belonged, had never been definitely settled. They had been called burial places of great chiefs, and not unnaturally had been thought by others to have been temples or places of primitive worship used by the Druids, who moreover were often credited with their erection. Obviously such a question called for settlement, and the British Association in the year 1898 appointed a committee to investigate these stone circles with a view to ascertaining their age. Operations were begun at the well-known circle of Arbor Low, south of Buxton in Derbyshire; careful excavations were made through the ditch and the encircling mound and also within the circle, and although the evidence was not of the most complete kind, yet the committee came to the conclusion that the circle belonged to the end of the neolithic age. At Arbor Low all the stones are now lying on the ground (although, to judge from the other circles in England, they were certainly once upright), and the opportunities for surveying were thereby much diminished. It is a fortunate circumstance, therefore, that the fall of one of the stones at Stonehenge (q.v.) at the end of the 19th century, and the increasingly perilous state of some of the others, caused the owner, with the advice of the Society of Antiquaries of London, to undertake the raising of the great leaning stone in the interior of the circle. The work was superintended by W. Gowland, F.S.A., who made special investigations during the necessary digging, for the purpose of recovering any remains of man's handiwork that had been left by the builders of the monument. In this he was very successful, finding in the course of the very limited excavation at the base of the monolith, a great number of stone mauls or hammers that corresponded so nearly with the bruised surfaces of the monoliths, that there can be no doubt of their having been used to dress the standing stones.

It must not be forgotten that although the neolithic period had many phases, yet its duration is in no way comparable to the incalculable length of the palaeolithic age. For a variety of reasons it is thought that one of the earliest stages of neolithic times is represented by the now well-known kitchen-middens (refuse-heaps) of Denmark. These heaps are often of great size, sometimes reaching 10 ft. in height, and nearly 350 yds. in length. Here along the coast line the natives of Denmark lived, apparently building their huts upon the mounds and cooking their food upon hearths of stone. The conditions of their daily life would seem to have resembled those of the natives of Tierra del Fuego. Their implements of flint seem to have been chipped only, and it is conjectured that the few polished and more highly finished implements that have been found in the middens are importations from more cultured tribes living inland. Their food was in very great part composed of shell-fish, though they evidently caught and ate various kinds of deer, boar and a variety of carnivorous animals. The race which made these mounds is believed to have been akin to the Lapps, and their dwellings can hardly have been anything more than the rudest protection from the weather. The Swiss lake-dwellers were far more advanced, even in the Stone Age; their dwellings were elaborately planned and constructed, and remains of them have been plentifully found in the various Swiss lakes. Various forms of construction were adopted: in one the foundations consisted of poles driven into the bed of the lake; in others a kind of framework simply rested on the bottom, and in a third, the substructure was formed of layers of sticks reaching from the bottom of the lake up to the surface. The walls were of wattle, closed up with clay to keep out the weather; the hearths were of stone slabs, and the floors of clay well trodden down. Practi-day in the year 1901. cally the same type of dwelling seems to have continued through the Stone and Bronze Ages, though on some sites no metal whatever is found and it is therefore assumed that these are of the earlier period. These people cultivated the land, growing wheat and barley; they were also hunters and fishermen, capable of manufacturing pottery without the aid of the wheel, which had not yet come into use so far north; and they wove mats and garments, while ropes and netting are plentiful. Their tools and weapons were made of stone, and to a great extent of deer's horn. Human remains are hardly ever found on the sites of the lake-dwellings, and it is therefore uncertain what were the social affinities of the people; but the evidence of the sites is in favour of the same race being continuous into the Bronze Age, when their condition was more comfortable, as is shown by the abundant remains of domesticated animals.

From a review of all the evidence of an archaeological nature that was to be obtained, Gowland came to the conclusion that the construction of Stonehenge belonged to the latter part of the neolithic age. No trace of a metal implement occurred in any of the debris. This would of itself be an interesting fact, but it became infinitely more interesting from researches in quite another direction, which brought corroborative evidence of a curious kind. For many years Sir Norman Lockyer and Prof. Penrose were engaged in examining the orientation of temples in Egypt and Greece, with a view to determining on what astronomical principle, if any, the plans had been laid down. With a rectangular plan, and with portions of the interior still well defined, they were able by elaborate calculation to determine that the temples had been definitely planned with relation to the rising or setting of the sun or of a particular star. Having been successful in these investigations they proceeded to apply the test to Stonehenge. The experiment was made on the longest Owing to a gradual change in the obliquity of the earth's orbit, the point of sunrise on corresponding days of each year is not constant; and though the difference is hardly perceptible from year to year, in the course of centuries it becomes great enough for use as a measure of time. Enough remains of the monument to show the direction of sunrise at the time that Stonehenge was erected, it being always assumed that the coincidence of the main axis with the central line of the Avenue was designed with reference to sunrise on the longest day of the year. At the date of the experiment it was found that the sun had shifted nearly two diameters in the interval, and this variation gives a date of about 1680 B.C., which practically confirms the verdict of archaeology and seems to prove, moreover, that Stonehenge was a temple of the sun.

Stonehenge therefore may be taken as marking for Britain the close of the neolithic period and heralding the dawn of a new

era, in which the inhabitants of the British Isles first acquired | the weapons and other property of a dead man is, however, not the art of working metal. always due to the belief that he may need them in some future state. The reason may well be that it would be thought unlucky for a survivor to use them.

Bronze Age.

There is reason to believe that the transition from the use of stone to that of bronze was not due to the peaceful advance of civilization, but rather to the irruption of an Aryan race from the south-east of Europe into the countries to the west and north. Of these people the Celts are to some extent the representatives at a somewhat more recent period. Here, however, we are dealing with terms the precise meaning of which is not yet generally admitted, and which, moreover, have too intimate a relation to the problems of philology to be fully discussed here (see INDO-EUROPEAN). The term Aryan (q.v.) itself is not free from objections. It was held by Max Müller to relate to a language and a civilization that took its rise in Central Asia, while others now contend that, although it is the mother language of the Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, Teutonic and Celtic languages, it might equally well have originated in Europe. However this may be, and even this brief statement shows how wide a field the arguments would cover, there can be little doubt that the Bronze Age Celts were of this stock, and that in course of time they gradually spread their language and culture over a large part of Europe. Whether or no the knowledge of bronze started from one or more centres, it gradually spread from the south-east of Europe until it reached Scandinavia; the dates being roughly in Crete, 3000 B.C.; in Sicily, 2500 B.C.; in central France, 2000 B.C.; in Britain and in Scandinavia 1800 B.C. The appearance of the Celts in Britain is indicated by the presence of the round barrows. They were a fairly tall, short-headed race, using cremation and also inhumation in their burials, skilful in the manufacture of pottery and of the simpler forms of bronze implements, and freely using bone, jet, and at times amber, while gold was well known and evidently greatly esteemed. In the early centuries of the Bronze Age, swords, spears and shields were apparently quite unknown, the principal metallic products being flat axes, simple knives or daggers, and small tools or ornaments. In the burial places the bodies, if unburnt, are nearly always found in a crouching position, as if in the attitude of sleep; if cremated, the burnt bones are generally enshrined in an urn under the tumulus, the burial being sometimes in a cist formed of large stones. The pottery vessels are remarkable in more ways than one. In the first place they would seem to have been specially made for the burial rites, for whenever domestic pottery has been found, it is of quite a different character, unornamented and simple in outline. It must be confessed, however, that this latter is by no means common. The sepulchral vessels are at times highly decorated, and sometimes of great size. They are invariably hand made, and though they are by no means well fired they are never sun-dried, as is often said to be the case. A common kind of decoration is produced by impressing twisted cords in the damp clay, and this is believed with some reason to have had its origin in the practice of winding cords round the unbaked vessel to prevent distortion before or during the process of firing. That operation would of course burn away the cord and leave only its impression on the urn. Other forms of ornament are also used, incised lines in rudely geometrical designs, impressions of the end of a stick, and at times rows of hollows produced by the finger or thumb. The method of the burial, beyond giving an insight into the art of the period, also helps us to realize to some extent the ideas of primitive man. The underlying reason for careful and ceremonial burial is not always readily understood, apart from a knowledge of the ritual, such as existed in ancient Egypt. But in the Bronze Age in Britain it was the custom to bury with the dead not only carefully made vessels which doubtless contained food for the journey to the lower world, but also the ornaments and weapons of the deceased. Often the bones of a pig have been found in the grave, doubtless representing part of the provender which could not conveniently be placed in the so-called food-vessel. Such practices indicate with a fair amount of certainty a belief in a future life in another world, where probably the conditions were thought to be much the same as in this. The burial of

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Just as the neolithic age was immeasurably shorter than the palaeolithic, but was notable for great improvements in the arts of life, so the Bronze Age in its turn was shorter than the neolithic age, and again witnessed even more marked advance in culture. It is in fact an illustration of the truism that each step in knowledge renders all that follow less laborious; but it is not easy to understand how the transition from stone to metal came about, nor why bronze came to be the chosen metal rather than iron. Bronze, in the first place, is a composite metal, a mixture of copper and tin, while iron can be at once reduced from its ores; indeed, in the form of meteoric iron, it is already metallic, and needs but a hammer to produce whatever form may be wanted. From the archaeological point of view, there is, however, good reason for believing that bronze preceded iron. The forms of axes that are without doubt the earliest, are in outline much the same as the stone prototype, being only thinner in proportion. Then again, iron implements are never found on the earlier sites, and if they had been in existence some of them certainly would remain: further, at the end of the Bronze Age it is found that the forms of weapons in that metal are exactly copied in iron, as, for instance, at Hallstatt (q.v.) in the Salzkammergut, the famous cemetery which best illustrates the passage from the use of bronze to that of iron. It has been claimed that bronze was preceded by copper, a sequence which seems inherently probable; and whether or no it was general enough or enduring enough to constitute a period, there can be no reasonable doubt that in the Mediterranean area, and in central Europe, as well as in Ireland, great numbers of implements were made of copper alone without any appreciable admixture of tin. The casting of pure copper presents certain difficulties, in that the metal is not adapted for anything but a mould open to the air, and this would limit its utility, until the discovery that tin in a certain proportion (roughly 1:9) not only made the resulting metal much harder and better fitted for cutting-tools and weapons, but at the same time rendered possible the use of closed moulds.

There are thus two problems in connexion with the history of the Bronze Age. How was the metal discovered? And by whom or where? As to the first, it must be remembered that in some parts of the world, e.g. in China and in Cornwall, copper and tin are found together, and it may well be that tin was first accidentally included as an impurity, which, had it been noticed, would have been eliminated. Once it was found to produce a more useful metal, the blend would be deliberately made, and repeated trials would eventually demonstrate the most suitable proportion of one metal to the other. The question of where it was first discovered is one that is not likely to be answered with certainty, but the one essential is the presence of the two metals in one and the same locality. Tin does not exist in either Egypt or Mesopotamia, although bronze articles from the fourth and third millennium respectively B.C. have been found in these countries. The tin to produce the mere metal must have come from some foreign country, and the choice seems to be very small. Spain at the other end of the Mediterranean is unlikely, and Britain still more so; central Asia, Asia Minor, or China again seem too remote; for the spread of metallurgy from these centres would imply a trade connexion nearly 4000 B.C. In later times, later perhaps by 3000 years, Spain and Britain were undoubtedly among the chief sources of the tin supply of Europe and of the Mediterranean generally; but it will long remain a problem where bronze was first produced. There is indeed, no real necessity for confining its origin to a single locality; it is easily conceivable that the invention occurred independently in more places than one.

The history of early metallurgy has been carefully studied by W. Gowland, who communicated the results of his researches to the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1899. In his opinion the ores from which copper was first obtained by smelting were

originally found as pebbles or boulders in the beds of streams, | where man in the Stone Age had been accustomed to search for stones to convert into implements; and in the same way the beds of rivers were for a long subsequent period the only sources of tin. Actual mining belongs in his opinion to a far later period, and naturally had its origin in the discovery of outcrops of the metal on the surface. By the simple application of fire, lumps of ore were reduced to a smaller size, and were then prepared for smelting by further reduction to the condition of a coarse powder. This latter process was carried out in the same way that grain was crushed between two stones; and stone-mills, doubtless used for the purpose, have been found in ancient workings in Wales. The next stage would be the furnace, and there can be little doubt that this would be of the simplest kind, merely a hole in the ground with the fire covering the metal, and with nothing but a natural draught. But Gowland holds that even with these singularly inadequate appliances, copper could be smelted from the surface ores, though the output would naturally be of the most uncertain and intermittent character, depending, as it must have done, on the wind. And until the discovery of bellows or some other method of increasing the draught of air, no progress could be made in this direction. With regard to the resulting metal, viz. copper, we have certain knowledge. From time to time there are found in the earth in Britain and elsewhere, hoards of fragmentary or imperfect bronze implements, portions of axes, swords, rings, &c., all of which have been failures in castings. These hoards are assumed to have been gathered together by the bronze founders to be recast into perfect and useful implements. Now, frequently associated with these hoards are portions of cakes of pure copper, originally circular in shape, flat on one face and convex on the other, like a lens with one flat face. The form of these cakes is in itself a fair proof of the prevalence of the method of smelting described above, as it is quite clear that the convex face of the cake followed the contour of the hole in the ground above which the fire was placed. The cakes are generally found broken up into small handy blocks. This can only be done in one way, viz. by watching the cake, after the fire and slag has been raked off it, until it is on the point of becoming solid, when it is quickly pulled out of the hole and broken up. It will be noted that while the implements in these founders' hoards are invariably of bronze, the cakes are as invariably of copper. This is at first sight puzzling, until it is realized that these founders probably carried the tin necessary for forming bronze in the form of ore, and that tin ore in its pure state is a snuffcoloured powder very easily overlooked when lying on the earth, which it might very nearly resemble in colour, though it would be much heavier. Thus it is probable that in many such discoveries the tin ore has accompanied the copper cakes and bronze fragments, but has hitherto eluded the eyes of the finder. Not only have we this conclusive evidence of the methods by which Bronze Age man produced his raw material, but the discovery of crucibles and moulds takes us a step further towards the finished implements. The crucibles are generally simple bowls of thick clay with an extension of the lip at one side to pour out the molten metal. Several of these, with plentiful traces of metal still remaining in them, were found by the brothers Siret in the Bronze Age settlement at El Argar in Murcia. In the same place also were found moulds of stone for the casting of simple triangular axes. These were of the class known as open moulds, one stone being hollowed to the desired form, the other half being simply a flat cover, with no relation to the form of the implement to be produced. From the nature of the metal, such a mould is the only kind in which the casting of an efficient copper implement would be possible; and among the objects discovered by the Sirets were articles in plenty of pure copper.

Much has been written in support of the theory that the bronze tools and implements found in this or that country must have been importations from southern and more highly civilized lands. More particularly has this been alleged with regard to Britain, which, lying as it did on the extreme limit of the ancient

world, was regarded as being dependent on the continent for the more complex weapons. The constant discovery, however, of these hoards of rough metal, as well as of moulds of the highest finish for casting swords, daggers, celts, and almost every kind of ancient bronze implement and weapon known to us, provides a conclusive proof of the contrary. The occurrence of a foreign type of implement is so rare as to be a source of especial gratification to the collector who secures it; and it may be taken that, in general terms, all the bronze swords, daggers and spears found in Britain were of home manufacture. Relations with the continent, however, did exist, as is shown by the occurrence of an Irish type of gold ornament in France and Scandinavia, and by the similarity of ornamental motives in the British Isles and elsewhere. Among the continental races it is natural to find intercommunication more common, owing to the absence of natural barriers. The weapons of the Bronze Age were swords, spears, daggers and axes (celts), though the last would be, equally well adapted for more peaceful purposes. The swords were usually of a narrow leaf shape, cast with the handle in one piece, the mounting of the grip and the pommel being added. For perfection of workmanship the weapons of this period have never been surpassed, and the skill of adjustment in the moulds, the fine and equal quality of the metal, and the flawless condition of the surfaces still excite wonder among the most expert of modern founders. The cutting edges of swords and "celts" were often, if not always, hammered to serve the double purpose of hardening that part of the weapon and sharpening the edge. In the case of the axe-heads (celts), this hammering had a distinct influence on the evolution of the form of the implement. The earliest celts, whether of copper or bronze, were in form, copies of their stone prototypes, and curiously enough exactly like the ordinary woodman's axe of to-day, but of course without the socket for the handle. Hammering rendered the cutting edge both broader and thinner, giving it at the same time a curved outline. This widened curve eventually became an ornamental feature, the two ends of the cutting edge becoming curved points and adding greatly to the elegance of the outline. Later, the other edges were finished by hammering also, at times in a simple ornamental fashion; and whether for greater rigidity or for some other reason, flanges were produced in the same way on those edges, which again affected the ultimate form of the celt. The early flat celt was no doubt simply fixed in a perforated wooden handle, which would naturally tend to split if wielded with any vigour. The side-flanges were in course of time utilized to prevent this, by allowing the use of a different form of handle. In place of the simple straight handle, a branch was cut with an elbow-joint, and its shorter limb then divided into two prongs, between which the metal passed, while the flanges, beaten up from the edges, overlapped the two forks; and no doubt a lashing of sinew was added to render the whole secure. This made a good serviceable tool or weapon, and prevented the splitting of the handle; but still another step was taken. The flanges on the edges met over the prong of the handle on either side, while the upper end of the celt itself eventually became a mere septum dividing the two openings. This septum was finally judged to be useless, and done away with; and the celt was cast with one hollow only for the reception of the ends of the handle; thus the flat celt became, by a natural process of evolution and improvement, a socketed celt. It is a curious fact, however, that the modern form of axe where the handle passes through a socket in the metal itself does not seem to have been much in favour in the Bronze Age, although it was a stone form that certainly survived into the succeeding period.

This and other shortcomings in what must have been the universal weapon and implement of the race, were remedied from time to time by various improvements in the form of the bronze axe-head and the method of hafting; and the various stages of development, from the flat blade of copper or bronze to the socketed implement and even to a pattern now in use, can still be traced in the Bronze Age specimens that have come down to us.

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STAGES IN THE EVOLUTION OF THE CELT OR IMPLEMENT OF CHISEL FORM.

(1) From stone to metallic form. (2) Growth of the stop ridge to palstave. (3) Growth of the wings to socket-celt.

By permission, from the British Museum Guide to the Bronze Age.

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