BY FRITZ NOLTLING, M.A., PH.D. 91 



proath to the stick, whioh primitive man hurled alike at 

 human enemies and animals required for food. 



Now, did the human beings who made the Cantal 

 Archseolithes already manufacture spears of the perenna 

 type, or had they not made that invention yet, and solely 

 used their stone implements in the manufacture of hunting 

 sticks (lughrana; ? The question is an intensely interesting 

 one, as the lughrana is the primary implement, the perenna 

 the later invention Now, when was the invention of the 

 perenna made? If, as Dr. Rutot and I hold, the Aixhaeo- 

 lithes from the Middle Oligocene were made by human 

 beings, it is very prohablc that these human beings used 

 them for the manufacture of the hunting sticks only, and 

 it is, perhaps, possible that the Cantalians had not advanc- 

 ed further. 



If this theory be correct, the invention of the perenna 

 (spear), i.e., the weapon which was thrown with a spinning 

 motion in a straight line at a distant enemy, must have been 

 made some time between the 1st Glacial Period ^Guenzian), 

 representing the Kentian industry and the beginning of the 

 Middle Interglacial Period, representing the Strepyian in- 

 dustrv. The Che' lean industry at the end of the Middle 

 Interglacial period had already learnt to provide the spear 

 with stone heads, and had therefore, in all probability, dis- 

 carded the wooden spear (33). 



If we knew for certain which of the Archaeolithic indus- 

 tries, from the Fagnian to the Mesvinian, used the hunting 

 stick only, and which used the wooden spear besides it, a 

 great stride in our knowledge of the development of the 

 human race would have been made. To judge from the 

 Archaeolithes from the Mesvinian, Maffelian, and Reutelian, 

 which my friend Dr. Rutot sent me, I have no doubt that 

 the representatives of these industries alreadv used the 

 A^ooden spear. If that be so, the invention of the wooden 

 spear as a weapon would have been made either in the 1st 

 Glacial Period (Guenzian) or in the Ist Interglacial Period, 

 both of which are now considered as Pliocene, forming the 

 end of the Tertiary Period in Europe (34). 



According to this theory, the human beings of the 

 warmer Tertiary epoch, i.e., the Oligocene and Miocene 



(33) This may have already commenced during the Strepyian. 



(34) ft is quite possible that a lucky find may solve this question; 

 if human hones have been preserved it is to be hoped that some day 

 the remain of a lughrana-like instrument or of a perenna-like spear 

 may be found. 



