THE TUNDRAS AND STEPPES OF PREHISTORIC EUROPE. 347 



the great ice sheets and glaciers, while the later came into existence 

 when glacial conditions were passing away. The tundra and steppe 

 conditions of our continent belong, in short, to that remarkable cycle of 

 climatic and geographical changes known as the Ice age or glacial 

 period. Paleolithic man undoubtedly lived through both phases, for 

 his relics and remains are found associated alike with the arctic lem- 

 mings and the succeeding steppe animals. Whether the reindeer hun- 

 ter of middle Europe ever came into contact there with the Neolithic 

 man we can not tell. Were we to trust to negative evidence we should 

 say he never did. But negative evidence can not be trusted. It is 

 quite possible that the two races may have met and even commingled, 

 but of this no proof is forthcoming. The strong hiatus that separates 

 the Old Stone and the New Stone epochs in western and northwestern 

 Europe has not yet been bridged over in middle and southern Europe. 

 When last we see Paleolithic man he is hunting the reindeer and the 

 mammoth in the Danubian steppes. His Neolithic successor seems not 

 to have appeared in middle Europe before steppe conditions had passed 

 away and a forest flora and fauna had become dominant. 



