THE EARLIEST MEN 173 



MAN AND HIS IMPLEMENTS. 



As far as our present knowledge, we know of the 

 existence of man upon this earth by the imple- 

 ments which he made before we know of him by 

 his physical remains. The question bristles with 

 difficulties as we have yet to see, but, on the whole, 

 the statement just made may be taken to represent 

 our knowledge at the moment. Nor is this difficult 

 to explain. In his earliest days man no doubt 

 used any object which came to his hand, stick, 

 stone or shell, provided that it was capable of 

 doing the bit of work which he had in hand at 

 the time, whether that bit of work was the slaying 

 of an animal, the preparation of its skin for wearing 

 purposes or what not. Some of the implements 

 thus employed would be perishable, and have 

 long since disappeared, others those of stone 

 would be practically imperishable, and these are 

 what have come down to us as the earliest relics, 

 though we have also objects of bone and horn of 

 great antiquity. Much dispute exists as to which 

 are the earliest objects which are quite clearly 

 the work of man's hands, and it may be well to 

 explain very briefly why this should be so. The 

 first point to bear in mind is, that the utilitarian 

 ideas of early man would very naturally lead him 

 to use a natural piece of stone, where such would 

 serve his purpose without any shaping or alter- 

 ation. It is obvious that it must always be very 

 difficult, and usually quite impossible, to detect 

 the fact that a given fragment of stone was once an 

 implement used by man when that fragment has not 



