56 Henry Dewey — PalceolitJiic Flake -implements. 



representative collection similar instances could be found. It is to 

 be hoped that the histories of the modification of other characteristic 

 forms may be traced. They are suggested by such forms as are 

 figured on Plate II, and especially the racloirs and grattoirs, and 

 there can be but little doubt that intermediate forms exist. 



These modifications of the implements imply changes in the needs 

 of the men who used them; changes brought about presumably by 

 different climatic conditions, the incoming of other animals and 

 plants, and the substitution of co-operation for hostile competition. 

 The decrease in the relative proportion of weapons to tools 

 accompanies the increase of civilization and marks the advent of the 

 artistic races. Co-operation among men was soon followed by that 

 larger co-operation between man and the animals, when the hunter 

 became the herdsman and shepherd ; the resulting domestication was 

 perhaps reciprocal. 



But it must always be remembered that the histories of the 

 several types of implement could never have been traced without the 

 aid of geology. For certainty as to relative chronology was 

 unattainable until the precise location of the finds was ascertained. 

 Before the necessity of such precision was realized no better 

 classification could be made than that of the late Lord Avebury, 1 

 who divided all flint implements into palaeolithic and neolithic. 2 All 

 that were not of the one age belonged to the other, and all members 

 of each group were considered to be more or less contemporaneous. 

 Geological observations, however, proved the error of such 

 generalizations, and supplied the means of fixing the relative 

 ages of the finds'. Flint implements then promised to become of 

 value to geologists as " zone " fossils, and although uncertainty still 

 exists obscurities are being cleared up. 



Conclusions. 



The early palaeolithic implements of France and Belgium have been 

 classified according to their form into two groups, namely, the coup- 

 de-poing or pear-shaped ; and the limande, or ovate, forms. 



Where these implements occur in river-deposits, e.g. in the Somme 

 Valley, the beds containing the "coups-de-poing" always underlie 

 those with the " limandes ". 



The "coups-de-poing" are therefore assigned to an earlier or 

 Chelles period and the " limandes " to a later or St. Acheul period. 



Later than these implementiferous deposits there are others of 

 a different character in which lie flake-implements known as 

 Le Vallois flakes; or, from their resemblance to the implements found 

 in caves at Le Moustier, as Mousterian. 



So far as scientific research has been carried in England a similar 

 sequence has been found. 



The dominant types of implements in the Chelles and the 

 St. Acheul periods were made from cores, whereas the Mousterian 

 ushered in a great abundance of flake-implements, among which 

 coups-de-poing and limandes are rare. 



1 But see Lyell, Antiquity of Man, 4th ed., 1873, ch. viii-x. 



2 Lubbock, Prehistoric Times, 1869. 



