By the Rev. W. C. Lukis. 159 



The race that erected those of the stone period in Denmark 

 was different from the race that lived in the bronze period, because 

 of their completely different barrows and funeral ceremonies, and 

 because he observes no gradual transition from the simple imple- 

 ments and weapons of stone to the beautifully wrought tools and 

 arms of bronze. The monuments and customs of the iron period 

 were, he thinks, merely the result of a greater development of 

 civilization, and a more lively intercourse with other nations, and 

 did not belong to a third race. He shows clearly enough that the 

 aboriginal race could not have been Fins, but not so clearly, I 

 think, that they were not Celts. He inclines to the belief that the 

 cromlechs of Denmark, Britain, and other countries where they 

 occur, " belonged to an older race who in the course of time have 

 disappeared before the immigration of more powerful nations, 

 without leaving behind them any memorials except the cromlechs 

 of stone in which they deposited their dead, and the implements 

 which by the nature of their materials were protected from decay," 

 pp. 132, 133. "Ail facts seem to shew," he says, "that the first 

 people who inhabited the North of Europe were without doubt 

 nomadic races of whom the Laplanders, or as they were formerly 

 called the Fins, are the remains, who had no settled habitations, 

 but lived on vegetables, roots, hunting and fishing. After them 

 came another race who evidently advanced a step further in civili- 

 zation, and possessed regular and fixed habitations. They diffused 

 themselves along those coasts which afforded them fitting opportu- 

 nities for fishing and hunting. They did not penetrate the interior 

 parts of Europe which were at that time full of immense woods 

 and bogs. They wanted metals for felling trees, and so opening 

 the interior of the country, for which their simple instruments of 

 stone were insufficient. They followed only the open coasts and 



there is some truth in the view which he rejects. It has never been satisfac- 

 torily demonstrated that cromlechs contain both stone and metal implements ; 

 on the contrary, metal has never been met with in the earliest interments. 

 Therefore there is something more than mere imagination in the " stone age ; " 

 and my belief is, that where metal has been found it belongs to a transition 

 period. There may not be so strong a line of demarcation between the bronze 

 and iron ages. 



