1 74 Prehistoric and Savage Man 



likely that man should have alone survived had he then 

 existed. 



Passing on, next, to Pleiocene times, we find even there 

 but insufficient evidence of man's presence. It is ti-ue that 

 a human skull and flint implements have been found at 

 Olmo, near Arezzo, in Italy, by Professor Cocchi, in deposits 

 deemed Pleiocene, but the evidence as to the true position 

 in which these objects were found is far from satisfactory, 

 and the existence also of a fragment of pottery seems con- 

 clusively to point to a much later date, as does the form of 

 the flint implement itself, which is of the more refined and 

 not of the ruder kind of make. We may, I think, say then 

 that there is no good evidence for the existence of even 

 Pleiocene man. This negative evidence is again supported 

 by the fact that almost, though not quite all, the species of 

 mammaha which lived in Pleiocene times have disappeared 

 from the earth. Anyhow man, however many centuries he 

 may have seen, is stilL geologically recent. But the Mam- 

 mahan population, which was undoubtedly contemporary 

 with early man, existed before the glacial epoch, and it 

 appears to me most probable that man was pre-glacial also. 



The remains of prehistoric man, yet unacquainted with 

 the use of metals, are classed in two groups, according to the 

 form of the implements he made. The older kind, roughly 

 though skilfully formed, are called Palaeolithic, and the 

 makers are known as Palaeolithic man. The newer kind, 

 carefully ground and pohshed, are called Neohthic, and their 

 makers are known as Neolithic man. 



The Palaeolithic men (the oldest men as yet certainly 

 known by their works) hved here under circumstances 

 widely different from our own. In their day the sea rolled 

 over what is now Norfolk and Suffolk ; England and Ireland 

 were physically one, and were continuous with the mainland 

 of Europe. Not only had he with his rough weapons to 



