A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



found in the same gravels as this fauna. These implements are rudely 

 chipped into the form man required, and the age has been thereby 

 termed the Palaeolithic age.' As has been stated, all the remains of 

 Prehistoric men who successively inhabited this small quarter of the 

 world prior to the Roman invasion have been arranged, classified and 

 grouped into certain periods ; these, beginning with the oldest, are 

 termed respectively the Palveolithic or Old Stone age, the Neolithic or 

 New Stone age, the Bronze age and Prehistoric Iron age. In dealing 

 with these ages or periods of primitive man one must not draw any 

 hard and fast line between them, for they will be found to overlap ; 

 for instance, the use of stone would be likely to continue into the Bronze 

 age, and stone for some purposes may have been more useful than 

 bronze ; so in the Prehistoric Iron age on the introduction of iron 

 the use of bronze did not cease but was continued for ornamental 

 purposes, as it was more capable of receiving ornament and decoration. 



The Paleolithic Age 



The remains of Palaeolithic men are usually grouped in two 

 divisions, those of the River Drift man, so called because his weapons 

 are found in the drift or gravels of the old rivers, and the Cave man, 

 whose remains are found in the debris of caves. 



That we can prove the presence of Paleolithic man in this county 

 is shown by the occurrence of several specimens of implements found in 

 gravels of the Nene valley. There are not many, it is true, but quite 

 sufficient to prove his appearance here, and no doubt more would turn 

 up if diligently sought for. Sir John Evans possesses one which he 

 himself picked up from a heap of gravel near King's Langley. The 

 gravel, he found on inquiry, came from near Oundle ; and in 1882 a 

 man working in a ballast pit in the parish of Fotheringhay, between 

 Oundle and Elton stations, brought to the writer a fine implement which 

 is also now in Sir John Evans' collection. Other specimens were found 

 in gravels of the Nene valley by the late Dowager Marchioness of 

 Huntley, but these came from Orton Longueville, which is on the 

 Huntingdonshire side of the Nene. Until the discovery in 1890 of 

 a Paleolithic implement from the valley of the Rea at Saltley near 

 Birmingham, the Nene valley was the most northern limit which had 

 yielded implements /// situ of this period. 



The remains of Cave men who belonged to a later period of the 

 PalcBolithic age than the River Drift men are known from the deposits 

 of certain caves, such as Kent's Caves and Brixham Cave, near Torquay, 

 and the caves of Creswell Crags in Derbyshire, which were discovered 

 by Prof Boyd Dawkins and the Rev. J. M. Mello in 1875. In one 

 of these, the Robin Hood Cave, over one thousand pieces of stone and 

 bone, showing evidence of man's handiwork, were obtained. The most 

 remarkable relic was a smooth portion of a rib with the head and fore- 



1 Yrovn falaios (iroXaios), ancient ; lithos (Xi^os), a stone. 

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