PART I. -EUROPE. 



1.— PALEOLITHIC AGE. 



GENERAL CHAEACTERISTICS. 



The long period during which man in Europe was not acquainted with the 

 use of metal, and made his implements and weapons of substances less service- 

 able, yet more immediately offered by the hand of nature, such as wood, bone, 

 horn, but especially stone, is generally termed the Stone Age. It has been 

 divided into two epochs, namely, the earlier or palaeolithic (old-stone) age, and 

 the later or neolithic (new-stone) age, these divisions marking unlike conditions 

 in the existence of the ancient inhabitants of Europe. During the pakTeolithic 

 age the climate of Europe was colder than at present, owing to a refrigeration 

 caused by glacial influences, and man then co-existed, at least in some parts of 

 the continent, with animals forming a fauna distinct fi'om that of later times. 

 The evidences of his presence at that remote epoch, in the shape of relics left 

 by him, have been derived iVom quaternary drift-beds and from caves, and will 

 be more minutely considered under these heads. This age presents man under 

 somewhat differing aspects, a separate treatment of which appears preferable to 

 a synoptical description. As a special feature of the period, however, it should 

 be mentioned that the stone implements pertaining to it, and nearly always made 

 of flint, are, so far as known, simply fashioned by flaking and chipping, the 

 practice of improving such implements by grinding and polishing being con- 

 sidered as characteristic of neolithic times. The art of making vessels of clay, 

 it may also be added, appears to have been unknown to palaeolithic man. 



THE DRIFT. 



Implements and Animal Remains. — The flint implements found in the qua- 

 ternary deposits along certain rivers in France and England are the oldest objects 

 fashioned by man of which we thus far have any positive knowledge.* These 



*The existence of "tertiary man" in Europe, still involved in uncertainty, is not touched upon in this 

 publication. 



(1) 



