EARLY MAN 



And so with the arrow-heads. Of these there are three main varieties : 

 the leaf-shaped ; the lozenge-shaped ; and the barbed and tanged. Two 

 great divisions met with elsewhere are almost wholly wanting : the tanged 

 without barbs, and the barbed without tang — the hollow-based. The former 

 is common in Italy and Egypt ; the latter in Ireland, Denmark, Egypt, and 

 Japan. The types present in Suffolk may be divided into many sub-types, 

 and they occur in very large numbers. They are frequently of the greatest 

 beauty, and the variety of material is as great as in the case of the scrapers. 

 One may repeat of the arrow-heads what was said of the scrapers, that a 

 picked collection is worthy to rank with a collection of jewels. 



Space prevents the consideration of all the many varieties of neolithic 

 implements so richly represented in Suffolk : the javelin-heads and spear-heads, 

 the knife-daggers, and knives of many sorts ; the ' fabricators ' and chisels ; 

 the axe-hammers and hammer-heads. Suffice it to say that for the most 

 part they yield in nothing to those found elsewhere. There is, however, one 

 class of implement found in great abundance in certain places in the county 

 which must not be passed over in silence. This is the ' midget ' or ' pigmy ' 

 flints. Those who have followed the course of prehistoric archaeology 

 during the past few years will be aware of the great importance which the 

 study of these tiny implements has assumed. They seem to occur almost 

 everywhere where neolithic man was firmly established ; though it is 

 especially in sandy places that the majority have been found — probably 

 from the much greater ease with which they can be discovered in wind-blown 

 sand than in heavy agricultural ground. Their first discovery in England 

 was made not in sand, but under a thick coating of peat, by Dr. CoUey 

 March, on the Lancashire moors. In Suffolk, however, it has been on sandy 

 heaths that they have been chiefly found ; and the same is true of the great 

 find at Scunthorpe in Lincolnshire, and in other places in England. Out of 

 England they have been found in Belgium, in many parts of France, in 

 Italy, Algiers, Tunis, Egypt ; whilst one of the most notable finds was that 

 of the late Mr. A. C. Carlyle in caves in the Vindhya Hills of Central India, 

 whence have come the most beautiful of any that have been anywhere found. 

 Many types occur, but the strange thing is the resemblance of the types from 

 all these widely scattered places. And the types are not simple, but highly 

 evolved and worked out with great deUcacy and precision. This resemblance 

 is so striking that it seems impossible that they should not have had a common 

 origin. Not only are the implements highly finished, but they are almost 

 always made of flint or other varieties of silica specially selected for their 

 beauty ; indeed, those from India are largely made of precious stones ; jasper, 

 chalcedony of the finest quality, agate, moss-agate, cornelian, and many other 

 beautiful stones. In size they are astonishingly small ; a highly-finished 

 little implement will be no larger than the paring of a little finger nail. 

 Little is known about them. They are neolithic, probably belonging to 

 some early phase of the period. Wherever found, they usually occur in 

 large numbers, and they are rarely mixed with the larger and more generally 

 recognized neolithic implements. As to their use, many suggestions have 

 been hazarded ; but it is doubtful whether any of these suggestions have 

 much probability of truth in them. Though their neoUthic origin seems 

 certain, yet minute implements, not very dissimilar, occur in certain palaeo- 



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