vi THE ARYAN QUESTION. 315 



ployed in Europe up to the palaso-metallic stage, 

 is to be found within the limits of Europe; and 

 there is no proof that the old races of domesticated 

 animals and plants could not have been developed 

 within these limits. If any one chose to main- 

 tain, that the use of bronze in Europe originated 

 among the inhabitants of Etruria and radiated 

 thence, along the already established lines of 

 traffic to all parts of Europe, I do not see that his 

 contention could be upset. It would be hard to 

 prove either that the primitive Etruscans could 

 not have discovered the way to manufacture bronze, 

 or that they did not discover it and become a great 

 mercantile people in consequence, before Phoeni- 

 cian commerce had reached the remote shores of 

 the Tyrrhene Sea. 



Can it be safely concluded that the palaao- 

 metallic culture which we have been considering 

 was the appanage of any one of the western 

 Eurasiatic races rather than another? Did it arise 

 and develop among the brunet or the blond long- 

 heads, or among the brunet short-heads? I do 

 not think there are any means of answering these 

 questions, positively, at present. Schrader has 

 pointed out that the state of culture of the primi- 

 tive Aryans, deduced from philological data, close- 

 ly corresponds with that which obtained among 

 the pile-dwellers in the neolithic stage. But the 

 resemblance of the early stages of civilisation 



