The Stone Ages of South Africa. 43 



and that of braver is quite likely, one important point is now estab- 

 lished, namely, that in parts of South Africa, very far distant from 

 each other, balls of sandstone, quartz, or dolerite have been found 

 together with bouchers of undoubtedly palaeolithic shape. 



The importance of their occurrence here is enhanced by the fact 

 that in the " Grotte de I'Ours," in France, balls of sandstone, of 

 calcareous stone, and of flint have been found together with 

 Mousterian domestic utensils (mobilier), which include amygdaloidal 

 Acheulean bouchers, Mousterian points, burins or graving tools, 

 borers, &c/'' Similar discoveries were made in the " Grotte de 

 I'Hyene," on a distinct Mousterian level, as well as in the " Quina " 

 deposit of the Reindeer period, i.e., Magdalenian, &c.i 



These discoveries, viewed in connection with ours, are of extreme 

 importance. Better than the bouchers, so many of which are of the 

 Mousterian facies,!: better than the flakers, scraper-knives — them- 

 selves types of great survival — these nuclei-like, and especially these 

 partly facetted or rounded stones, justify us in connecting the older 

 lithic industry of South Africa with a Mousterian culture — a culture 

 which is not restricted to the manufacture of large cleaving- or 

 digging-stone tools. 



Flakes and Scbaper-ivnives. 



Had we to deal only with the more or less almond-shaped, or with 

 partially tongue-shaped tools, or even the rougher implements that 

 served an identical purpose, doubt w^ould not be permissible, and 

 the South African implements of that type might, with safety, be 

 considered as belonging to the Chelleo-Mousterian, and even to 

 correspond in age. 



But the presence of flakes, mostly, but not necessarily always, 

 arge, greatly complicates matters, because their fabrication and 

 use are continued until a time which is here practically that of 

 yesterday. This may be due to their useful primitiveness. 



That these scraper-knives were originally evolved from spalls 

 resulting from the preliminary trimming of the bouchers no one 



* C/., Chauvet, " Stations Quaternaires " ; — Parat, "La Grotte de I'Ours," &c. 



f The quartzite bouchers of the Pyrenean region, which so greatly resemble those 

 occurring here, possibly on account of the difficulty they offer to trimming, are 

 connected by Dechelette with Acheulean and Mousterian periods. 



I The Mentone caves as well as the Taulbagh deposit have demonstrated the 

 fact that in the early quaternary period (pleistocene), there were to be found primi- 

 tive implements resembling more the Mousterian than the typical Chellean or 

 Acheulean " coup de poing." 



