SCIENTIFIC SIDE-LIGHTS 



Antiquity 



sary, however, to discuss these chronologies, 

 inasmuch as new evidence has so changed 

 the aspect of the subject that the quasi- 

 historical schemes of the last century would 

 now hardly be maintained by any competent 

 authority of any school. Geology, notwith- 

 standing the imperfection of its results, has 

 made it manifest that our earth must have 

 been the seat of vegetable and animal life 

 for an immense period of time; while the 

 first appearance of man, tho compara- 

 tively recent, is positively so remote that 

 an estimate between twenty and a hundred 

 thousand years may fairly be taken as a 

 minimum. This geological claim for a vast 

 antiquity of the human race is supported 

 by the similar claims of prehistoric arche- 

 ology and the science of culture, the evi- 

 dence of all three departments of inquiry 

 being intimately connected and in perfect 

 harmony. DANIEL WILSON Anthropology, 

 ch. 5, p. 17. (Hum., 1885.) 



196. ANTIQUITY OF POTTERY Ho- 

 mer's Mention. In the very earliest graves 

 and camp-sites no fragments of pottery oc- 

 cur. If our first parents were makers 

 thereof, we should know it, because this 

 most brittle of human works is also among 

 the most enduring. Fire-making devices 

 were invented before pottery, because all of 

 it was effected by means of fire, if we except 

 sun-dried bricks and lamp-stoves. The bow 

 and the arrow, the spear and the fish-hook, 

 are older. They are found in older graves. 

 Can it be that this art came in with the 

 grinding of food? At any rate, it long 

 antedated Homer, for the potter's wheel is 

 mentioned by him (II. xviii, 600). The 

 simpler hand epoch antedates all books and 

 writings, and there are many, many tribes 

 of uncivilized peoples on the earth making 

 beautiful ware who do not read at all. 

 The lake-dwellers had pottery, and so had 

 the mound-builders, and the people of very 

 ancient Troy. In Peru beautiful specimens 

 come from the oldest graves, and over the 

 canons of Colorado, and especially of its 

 tributaries, hundreds of complete vessels, 

 and millions of fragments, are scattered 

 similar to that made near-by to-day. 

 MASON Origins of Invention, ch. 5, p. 154. 

 (S., 1899.) 



197. ANTIQUITY OF SEVEN-DAY 



WEEK Not Used by Greeks and Romans. 

 Whichever of the three processes may 

 have been used, the interesting point for us 

 to know is that the division of time by 

 periods of seven days is of the highest 

 antiquity and due to the phases of the 

 moon, but that it has not been in use among 

 all nations, for the Greeks and Romans did 

 not make use of it, the first having weeks 

 of ten days (decades), and the second 

 counting by kalends, ides, and nones. But 

 it came into almost general use about the 

 first century of our era. FLAMMARTON 

 Popular Astronomy, bk. ii, ch. 2, p. 103. 

 (A.) 



198. ANTIQUITY OF SUN-WORSHIP 



Every scholar knows, tno litterateurs 

 and men of the world do not, that in the 

 full vigor of the Greek religion the Sun 

 and Moon, not a god and goddess thereof, 

 were sacrificed to as deities older deities 

 than Zeus and his descendants, belonging 

 to the earlier dynasty of the Titans (which 

 was the mythical version of the fact that 

 their worship was older) and these deities 

 had a distinct set of fables or legends con- 

 nected with them. MILL Rasitive Philos- 

 ophy of Auguste Comte, p. 20. (H. H. & 

 Co., 1887.) 



199. ANTIQUITY OF THE ARCH 



Found in Tombs of Egypt Neglect of, by 

 Greeks Skilful Use of, by Romans. In the 

 tombs of ancient Egypt real arches are to 

 be seen, constructed in mud-bricks, or later 

 in stone, by architects who quite understood 

 the principle. Yet tho the arch was 

 known in what we call ancient times, it was 

 not at once accepted by the world. It is 

 remarkable that the Greek architects of the 

 classic period never took to it. It was left 

 to the Romans, who applied it with admi- 

 rable skill, and from whose vaulted roofs, 

 bridges, and domes those of the medieval 

 and modern world are derived. TYLOR 

 Anthropology, ch. 10, p. 235. (A., 1899.) 



200. ANTIQUITY OF WEAVING 



The textile art is older than the human 

 species. For not only spiders and many 

 caterpillars drew out extremely fine 

 threads, but birds wove nests long before 

 man's advent on earth. And, most signifi- 

 cant of all, in tropical lands especially, 

 trees and plants fabricated cloth, which 

 men have worn from time immemorial, and 

 on it they have also preserved their 

 thoughts. There is no reason to doubt that 

 the very first women were weavers of a 

 crude kind, and that the textile art has 

 been with us always in one form or another. 

 MASON Origins 'of Invention, ch. 7, p. 224. 

 (S., 1899.) 



201. ANTIQUITY, REMOTE, OF 

 MOUND-BUILDERS Where it [an ancient 

 mound] is most distinct, it is from fif- 

 teen to twenty feet wide, by three or four 

 in height. The area thus enclosed is about 

 one hundred and forty acres, and the wall 

 is two miles and a quarter in length. The 

 stones themselves vary much in size, and 

 Messrs. Squier and Davis suggest that the 

 wall may originally have been about eight 

 feet high, with an equal base. At present 

 trees of the largest size are growing upon 

 it. On a similar work known as " Fort 

 Hill," Highland County, Ohio, Messrs. 

 Squier and Davis found a splendid chestnut 

 tree, which they suppose to be six hundred 

 years old. " If," they say, " to this we add 

 the probable period intervening from the 

 time of the building of this work to its 

 abandonment, and the subsequent period 

 up to its invasion by the forest, we are led 



