2G0 R. B. Foote— ^oi^es on some recent Neolithic and [No. 3, 



before making a further one, did I not believe that I have really fresh 

 matter of great interest to lay before you, having during the last few 

 years made various finds which determine the age of a hitherto uncer- 

 tain group of remains, and throw light on the connection of the Neolithic 

 and Iron periods. The mere discovery of important centres of manu- 

 facture of Neolithic or polished stone implements is by itself a point of 

 great interest, and I have the pleasure of informing you of the discovery 

 of several centres of the kind. 



Most archaeologists regard it as a well-established fact that our 

 ancestors, to speak of mankind generally, passed through at least three, 

 and in some countries four, grades of progressive civilization indicated 

 by the character and material of their weapons and domestic imple- 

 ments. 



In South India, up to the present day, three of these grades, or 

 periods, are known to have been passed through by the old inhabitants ; 

 the Rude Stone Period, the Polished Stone Period, and the Iron Period. 

 A Bronze or Copper Period has not, so far, been traced in the south, and 

 iron had been introduced among the people living in the Southern 

 Deccan, and was probably manufactured by them at the same time that 

 they were still using and making implements of polished stone. 



I have used the terms Palaeolithic and Neolithic not only because 

 they are extremely convenient, but because, so far as South India is con- 

 cerned, they are, so far as our present knowledge goes, very fit and suit- 

 able terms. Abundant geological evidence exists in the south that a 

 great period of time elapsed between the era of the old Stone-chippers 

 and that of the Stone-polishers. 



Whether the latter were descendants of the former is at present 

 impossible to say, for no evidence has been yet found to prove or dis- 

 prove the idea. 



§ 2. The former existence of the old Stone-chippers in South India 

 was unknown till 1863, when I had the good fortune to discover the first 

 chipped implement in a lateritic gravel at Palaveram a few miles south 

 of Madras. A few months later, Dr. King and I had the further good 

 fortune to come upon another lateritic gravel some forty miles north-west 

 of Madras, where implements, all made of quartzite, occurred in situ and 

 abundantly. A fine series of these, including many of the type speci- 

 mens figured in my papers in the Madras Literary Society's Journal 

 and the volume of the Norwich Prehistoric Congress (1868), is now 

 in the Indian Museum. 



At that time, no discovery of Neolithic or polished implements had 

 been published, nor, so far as I know, had any been made, and it fell to 

 m© to make the first discovery of such during the course of the follow- 



