History of Ancient Civilization

THE ORIGINS OF CIVILIZATION

P

REHISTORIC ARCHAEOLOGY

=Prehistoric Remains.=-One often finds buried in the earth, weapons, im-

plements, human skeletons, debris of every kind left by men of whom we

have no direct knowledge. These are dug up by the thousand in all the

provinces of France, in Switzerland, in England, in all Europe; they are found

even in Asia and Africa. It is probable that they exist in all parts of the world.

These remains are called prehistoric because they are more ancient than writ-

ten history. For about fifty years men have been engaged in recovering and

studying them. Today most museums have a hall, or at least, some cases filled

with these relics. A museum at Saint-German-en-Laye, near Paris, is entirely

given up to prehistoric remains. In Denmark is a collection of more than

30,000 objects. Every day adds to the discoveries as excavations are made,

houses built, and cuts made for railroads.

These objects are not found on the surface of the ground, but ordinarily

buried deeply where the earth has not been disturbed. They are recovered

3 CHARLES SEIGNOBOS

from a stratum of gravel or clay which has been deposited gradually and has

fixed them in place safe from the air, a sure proof that they have been there

for a long time.

=Prehistoric Science.=-Scholars have examined the debris and have asked

themselves what men have left them. From their skeletons, they have tried

to construct their physical appearance; from their tools, the kind of life they

led. They have determined that these instruments resemble those used by

certain savages today. The study of all these objects constitutes a new science,

Prehistoric Archaeology.[1]

=The Four Ages.=-Prehistoric remains come down to us from very diverse

races of men; they have been deposited in the soil at widely different epochs

since the time when the mammoth lived in western Europe, a sort of gigantic

elephant with woolly hide and curved tusks. This long lapse of time may be

divided into four periods, called Ages:

1. The Rough Stone Age.

2. The Polished Stone Age.

3. The Bronze Age.

4. The Iron Age.

The periods take their names from the materials used in the manufacture of

the tools, -stone, bronze, iron. These epochs, however, are of very unequal

length. It may be that the Rough Stone Age was ten times as long as the Age

of Iron.

THE ROUGH STONE AGE

=Gravel Debris.=-The oldest remains of the Stone Age have been found in

the gravels. A French scholar found between 1841 and 1853, in the valley of

the Somme, certain sharp instruments made of flint. They were buried to a

depth of six metres in gravel under three layers of clay, gravel, and marl which

had never been broken up. In the same place they discovered bones of