EARLY MAN 



no traces of cave-dwellers in Essex, though it is possible that the chalk 

 range of the north-west or the outcrop on the south afforded opportunity 

 for excavating such homes. 1 



THE NEOLITHIC PERIOD 



Ere neolithic man appeared great geological changes occurred, 

 separating our lands from the continent by a channel. How long a 

 time elapsed before the new race occupied the land we know not, nor 

 where the continuity of the human species was maintained. We do 

 know that man survived in more favoured regions of the earth, if not 

 here, and migrated thence, bringing with him a higher civilization than 

 had existed in the older times. 



That he was far in advance of his palaeolithic predecessors is amply 

 evidenced by the greater variety of implements, the higher finish of 

 many, and the introduction of pottery. The most prolific sources of 

 relics have been burial barrows (generally long in shape and with 

 skeleton remains, showing that the practice of inhumation prevailed), 

 the sites of lake or mere-dwellings, and those of neolithic manufac- 

 tories. 



That the characteristic long barrows of neolithic man have existed 

 in Essex is likely, but probably in the days of prosperous agricultural 

 operations every example was destroyed, and we can only surmise the 

 possibility of their existence at places where many relics have been 

 found together. Nor have we yet discovered any example of a pile or 

 fascine dwelling of undoubted neolithic date, though it seems possible 

 that the recently-discovered traces of early habitation in the hollow of 

 the Brain or Pod river near Braintree are of very early origin (see p. 270). 



It is tolerably certain that a ' factory ' existed near Walton-on-the- 

 Naze, where so many neolithic weapons have been unearthed, as chips 

 and waste are also found. 



The wide range of articles of the neolithic period makes it necessary 

 to refer to the principal forms only. 



Typical neolithic celts are of well-polished flint or other hard stone, 

 but some which we know to be of the same period, from the circumstances 

 of the discoveries, are rough-hewn or chipped, as were the palaeolithic 

 weapons. 



The celts were used as hatchets, adzes or axes, the cutting end of the 

 weapon being sharpened to an efficient edge by grinding. 1 Stone imple- 

 ments of similar form are still used by the North American Indians as 

 skinners for removing the hides of animals from the flesh (figs. 3, 4). 



Wheresoever neolithic man's traces are observable, we find flakes of 

 flint some mere wasters thrown aside when the parent block was struck 



1 The Hon. R. C. Neville (afterwards Lord Braybrooke) in 1848 opened a chamber at Heydon 

 on the extreme north-west of Essex, which contained Roman remains. The chamber may possibly 

 have been excavated long before Romano-British days, though used in that period. 



* A remarkable example from Walton, of greenstone, with grooves worked vertically to its cutting 

 edge, is in Dr. Layer's collection. 



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