THE BUILDERS 



nothing to show that they wove the thread into 

 stuffs. 



The love of personal decoration was highly 

 developed among them, and all branches of nature 

 were called upon to minister to their desire for 

 ornament. Shells, pierced and strung separately 

 or in masses, were perhaps their favourite adorn- 

 ment, but close on these follow beads and pendants 

 of almost every conceivable substance, bone, horn, 

 stone, clay, nuts, beans, copper, and occasionally 

 gold. 



One small object assumes a great importance 

 on account of its wide distribution. This is the 

 conical button with two converging holes in its 

 base to pass the thread through. This little object, 

 which may have served exactly the purpose of 

 the modern button, occurs in several parts of the 

 megalithic area. There are examples in Malta 

 made of stone and shell. Elsewhere it is most 

 usually of bone. It occurs in Sardinia, in France, 

 in the rock- tombs of Gard, and in the corridor and 

 rock-tombs of Lozere and Ardeche, in Portugal 

 in the allee couverte of Monte Abrahao, in Bohuslan 

 (Sweden), and at Carrowmore in Ireland. Outside 

 the megalithic area it has been found in two of the 

 Swiss lake-dwellings and in Italy. 



The pottery of the megalithic people was of a 

 simple type. It was all made by hand, the potter's 

 wheel being still unknown to the makers. Pottery 

 with painted designs does not occur outside Sicily, 



i3S 



