THE OLD STONE AGE 
cold and dry, and much of the surface of Europe then con- 
sisted of treeless grassland over which swept in summer 
thick dust storms obscuring the sun, and in winter terrible 
cold winds and blizzards. Nevertheless, the Solutreans 
seem to have lived mainly in the open. Possibly they had 
developed some sort of habitation of skins stretched on 
poles, akin in principle to the tepee of the Plains Indians 
or the yurt of the Mongols. Of this, however, we can ex- 
pect to find no direct evidence. 
During the Solutrean epoch the animal life differed 
comparatively little, at least in the generality of its forms, 
from that of the Aurignacian. 
In eastern Europe, especially in Poland and Hun- 
gary, remains of the Mousterian epoch, as already stated, 
are followed directly by those of the Solutrean. This 
rather indicates that the latter type of culture appeared in 
those regions before the Aurignacians had had time to 
work their way that far east. There seems, at least, to be 
no doubt that the Solutrean culture originated in the east 
and gradually extended westward, improving its technique 
of flint-working as it went. Its impetus, from whatever 
cause It arose, spent itself before reaching the lands border- 
ing upon the Mediterranean Sea; for in these it does not 
occur. 
At the beginning of the Solutrean epoch the new method 
of shaping implements which forms its special character- 
istic, that known as “‘pressure flaking,” was rare and un- 
important. Later on, however, it developed to a pitch 
never excelled during the Old Stone Age. 
The flint implements of this period fall into two distinct 
classes. The first occurs in one form or another throughout 
the entire Upper Paleolithic and consists of single and 
double scrapers, drills, burins, retouched flakes, and the 
like. The second consists of the “leaf” types of flint 
blades, which characterize the Solutrean epoch alone and 
disappear entirely at its close. These, from their shapes, 
have been aptly called by the French archeologists the 
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