STONE IMPLEMENTS USED AFTER DISCOVERY OF METAL. 81 



the sites of dwellings or villages, there are many instances in 

 which considerable numbers have been met with under cir- 

 cumstances which show that they were purposely deposited, 

 either hidden away for future use, or perhaps, as Worsaae has 

 maintained,* as offerings to the gods. Thus at Frederickville 

 in Illinois, 3500 disks of flint were found at a depth of about 

 five feet ranged carefully side by side ; in Eoss County, Ohio, 

 4000 disks and pointed instruments of stone were found near 

 some ancient mounds known as Clark's Work. 



We have indeed in our very language evidence of the exist- 

 ence of a stone age, for our word " chisel" is merely the German 

 kiesel, flint, and carries us back to the time when the chisel 

 was not steel, but merely a sharp stone. 



Yet the very existence of a Stone Age is, or has lately 

 been, denied by some eminent archaeologists. Thus Mr. 

 Wright, the learned Secretary of the Ethnological Society, 

 while admitting that " there may have been a period when 

 society was in so barbarous a state that sticks or stones were 

 the only implements with which men knew how to furnish 

 themselves," doubts "if the antiquary has yet found any 

 evidence of such a period." And though the above figures 

 are sufficient to prove that stone was at one time used for 

 many implements which we now make of metal, this is not 

 in itself a conclusive answer to Mr. Wright, nor in fact would 

 it be denied by that gentleman. Moreover, there is DO doubt 

 that in early ages stone and metal were used at the same 

 time, the former by the poor, the latter by the rich. 



If we consider the difficulties of mining in early days, the 

 rude implements with which men had then to work, their 

 ignorance of the many ingenious methods by which the opera- 

 tions of modern miners are so much facilitated, and, finally, the 

 difficulties of carriage either by land or water, it is easy to see 

 that bronze implements must always have been very expensive. 



* Met. p. Serv. 1882, p. 131. 

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