Mr. Skertchly, of the Geological Survey of England, has furnished still another estimate, based on the growth of the Fen-beds on the east coast of England. It is sufficient to state that he also arrives at an estimate of about seven thousand years for the Neolithic period.21 Now these results are interesting, and their substantial agreement is, to say the least, striking. We must remember, however, that none of them are free from error. They may serve to clear up our thoughts on this subject, but we notice they tell us nothing as to the beginning of the Neolithic Age.
Abandoning the effort to obtain dates for the various ages, attempts have been made to calculate the entire interval that has elapsed since the close of the Glacial times, and thus set bounds to the first appearance of Neolithic man. We briefly touched on this question in determining the antiquity of the Paleolithic Age, and we say, as far as this country was concerned, it was comparatively a recent thing, but as for Europe, it must be at a very remote time. M. Quatrefages has called our attention to two investigations in Europe, which, in order to understand this question, we will now glance at. The waters of the Rhone carry into Lake Geneva every year quantities of sediment. In other words, from this and other sources, the lake is gradually being filled up. Carefully calculating the amount carried into the lake in a year, estimates have been made of the length of time it has taken the river to fill up the lake as much as it has.
But in making this calculation the date arrived at was a maximum one—that is, a point beyond which it is not reasonable to suppose the time extended. These calculations gave as a result one hundred thousand years. The meaning of this is that the time elapsed since the close of the Glacial Age was something less than the number just stated. On the other hand, a minimum date for this time has been obtained by estimating the amount of erosion in the valley of the River Saone, in France. From this we know that the time can not be less than seven thousand years.22
It is, perhaps, doubtful whether we shall ever be able to obtain satisfactory answers to these questions. From what we have repeatedly seen of the slowness of development of primitive man, we do not doubt but what the antiquity of Neolithic Man goes much farther back than seven thousand years. When a naturalist finds in widely separated parts of the world animals belonging to a common order, he is justified in concluding that the order is a very ancient one. To illustrate, the opossum belongs to an order of animals of which the only other representatives are found in Australia and the neighboring islands.23 We are not surprised, therefore, to learn that this order was the first to appear in geological time.24 We think the rule is equally applicable to races of men. We are told that the Turanian race, or, as it is often named, the Mongoloid race, is a very widely scattered one. Its representatives are found over the larger portion of Asia, in Northern Europe, the islands of the Pacific; and they were the only inhabitants of the New World at the time of the conquest.25 This wide dispersion would imply that they were one of the ancient races of the world, and as such their antiquity must be far greater than the above named number of years.
This point grows clearer when we see what light is afforded on this subject by historical research. The Turanian people were in full possession of Europe while yet the ancestors of the Hindoos and the various European nations dwelt together as one people in Asia. As a race they had grown old when the Celts commenced their wanderings. Egypt comes before us as a powerful people, at a time at least as early as six thousand years ago. Even at that time they had attained civilization. But we need not doubt that there is a long series of years lying back of that, during which this people were slowly advancing from a previous condition of barbarism. The Egyptian people themselves are, in part at least, descendants of a Turanian people that probably in former times occupied the valley of the Nile and North Africa.26
Mr. Geikie has lately gone over the entire ground from the point of view of a geologist. He ranges over a wide field, and appeals in support to writers of acknowledged ability in all branches of learning.27 Yet the impression we gather from his writings is that of ill-defined, but far-reaching antiquity, one necessary to account for the great climatic and geographical changes which he shows us have taken place since the Glacial Age. But he tells us that any term of years he could suggest would be a mere guess. We can not do better than leave the matter here. Perhaps as a result of the research of our present scholars, we may soon have more precise results.
These closing essays have impressed on us clearly and distinctly the isolation of the Paleolithic Age. When we reflect on its prolonged duration, its remoteness in time, and its complete severance from the Neolithic and succeeding ages, we are almost ready to wonder whether they were indeed human beings. But beginning with the Neolithic Age, we come to our own era. This primitive culture seems to have been the commencement of our own culture, and so the industries, household implements, and weapons of these ages possess a greater interest to us. We have now completed our inquiry into prehistoric life in Europe, and are ready to turn our attention to other parts of the field. What we have thus far learned shows us how true it is that the past of human life on the globe is full of mystery. We trust that what has been written will enable our readers to form clearer conceptions of life in Europe during these far away times.
REFERENCES
- Dana’s “Manual of Mineralogy,” p. 230.
- “Primitive Man,” p. 298.
- Evans’s “Ancient Stone Implements,” p. 5.
- Evans’s “Ancient Bronze Implements,” p. 8.
- “Ancient Bronze Implements,” p. 3.
- Ibid., p. 40.
- Ibid., p. 19.
- Figuier’s “Primitive Man,” p. 300.
- “Ancient Society,” p. 216.
- Figuier’s “Primitive Man,” p. 325.
- “Prehistoric Times,” p. 7.
- M. Desor, in “Smithsonian Reports,” 1865, tells us that small brass rings were probably used by people of the Swiss lake villages of the Bronze Age epoch as money.
- Figuier’s “Primitive Man,” p. 310.
- Lubbock’s “Prehistoric Times,” p. 7.
- Lubbock’s “Prehistoric Times,” p. 17.
- Evans’s “Ancient Bronze Implements,” p. 1.
- “Smithsonian Report,” 1860, p. 342.
- Ibid.
- Mr. Southall, in “Recent Origin of Man,” p. 475, quotes, from Dr. Andrews, of Chicago, to the effect that these calculations are very erroneous, as he thinks that M. Morlot forgot that the size of the cone would increase more and more slowly. On the contrary, M. Morlot says as follows: “Only this growth must have gone on at a gradually diminishing rate, because the volume of a cone increases as the cube of its radius. Taking this fact into consideration, etc.” (Smithsonian Report, 1860, p. 341.) There are, however, several objections to this calculation, for which see Lubbock’s “Prehistoric Times,” p. 400; also Quatrefages’s “Human Species,” p. 138.
- Lubbock’s “Prehistoric Times,” p. 402. For criticisms on this calculation see Southall’s “Recent Origin of Man.”
- British Assoc. Rep., 1879.
- Quatrefages’s “Human Species,” p. 139, et seq.
- Nicholson’s “Manual of Zoölogy,” p. 535.
- Dana’s “Manual of Geology,” p. 416, note.
- Keary’s “Dawn of History,” p. 382; Morgan’s “Systems of Consanguinity and Affinity.”
- Dawkins’s “Early Man in Britain,” p. 324.
- “Prehistoric Europe,” chap. xvi to xxii.