344 EARLY MAN IN BRITAIN. [CHAP. x. 



lead to warfare, and as the Celtic peoples to the east 

 and south of Gaul would be likely to benefit first by 

 the discovery, they would be the first to use the new 

 weapons in their wars against their hereditary enemies 

 the Iberic tribes of the west. 



The use of bronze did not immediately drive out the 

 use of polished stone in this country. In the tumulus, 

 for example, at Upton Lovel, 1 Wilts, four flint celts, a 

 perforated hammer-axe, numerous bone implements, and 

 a bronze pin, were found along with the unburnt bones of 

 the dead. In three barrows in Yorkshire also, the Eev. 

 W. Green well 2 has discovered polished stone axes, in 

 two cases along with the ashes of the dead, and with 

 vases ; and in a third under conditions which did not 

 necessarily imply that it was connected with an inter- 

 ment. That these stone implements really belong to 

 the Bronze age is proved by the practice of cremation 

 and the presence of the characteristic pottery, un- 

 known in this country before. While the chiefs and 

 the rich possessed bronze implements and weapons, 

 the poorer classes would naturally continue to use those 

 of stone, and bronze could only have come into universal 

 use when it became cheap. 



The Classification of the Bronze Age in Britain. 



The Bronze age in Britain is divided by Mr. Evans 3 

 into an early and a late stage, the first of which was a 

 period of transition, when the use of bronze was super- 

 seding that of stone, and is characterised by the pre- 

 sence of bronze daggers (Figs. 114, 115) and plain wedge - 



1 Archaologia, xv. 124 ; xviii. 405. 

 2 Ancient British Barrows, pp. 136, 179, 319. 

 ' Proceed. Soc. Antiq., 23d Jan. 1873. The Bronze Period. 



