210 DEVELOPMENT AND PURPOSE CHAP. 



Passing to practical application, we have first a stage in 

 which man is almost entirely dependent on that which 

 nature offers him for his support. His tools and weapons 

 are of flint, bone and wood. If of metal it is of metal in 

 the pure state requiring no smelting. His dwellings are 

 caves or at best wind-breaks and the rudest huts. His 

 clothing is non-existent or composed of skins and furs 

 sewn with bone needles and animal sinews. His food 

 is obtained mainly by hunting and fishing. He has 

 tamed the dog to assist him in hunting, but has no regular 

 live stock. 1 He has no knowledge of health and disease, 

 but imputes natural death to witchcraft. His powers of 

 counting are small, and though he can draw and carve, he 

 has no writing. At most he may here and there use picto- 

 graphs to communicate certain information, and perhaps 

 certain signs by way of memoranda. 2 The only exception 

 to his general dependence on natural supplies is his power 

 to light a fire, the origin of which is still the subject of 

 guesses rather than of any scientific certainty. Such in 

 rough outline is the culture of the lowest hunting races, 

 now becoming extinct, and, so far as the available evidence 

 enables us to judge, of the Palaeolithic Age. Its broad 

 characteristic is the use of the gifts of Nature with the 

 minimum of transformation. The improved implements 

 of the Upper Palaeolithic levels appear to mark the begin- 

 nings of more specialised industries, each with its definite 

 rule-of-thumb tradition. The transition to the Neolithic 

 Age is the result of their maturity. Smoothly polished 

 implements come very largely into use. Spinning and 

 weaving become regular arts, the use of earthenware is 

 general, boats are built, and, according to the character of 

 the environment, society becomes either pastoral, and 

 increasingly rich in flocks and herds, or agricultural, and 

 settled in permanent habitations, often especially if the 

 Joint Family system develops of considerable size. 



1 ' Magdalenian ' man would seem also to have driven the reindeer 

 (see Sollas, Ancient Hunters, p. 347). 



2 Marks of unknown meaning which may have served these purposes are 

 not uncommon among Upper Palaeolithic remains (Ibid. pp. 243, 312, 

 etc.). 



