Fig. 263. Stages in the manufacture of the Neolithic stone ax, or hache. After de Mortillet. 534. Hache of flint, roughly flaked into shape, from Olendon, Calvados. 535. Hache of flint from Oise, ready for polishing. It has been finely chipped to a shape of perfect symmetry, with especial care to smooth out and reduce the large facets made by the preliminary flaking. 536. Hache of flint after the first polishing, from Abbeville, on the Somme. The cutting edge has been completely polished, but along the sides the facets made by flaking are plainly visible. 537. Hache of flint completely polished, from Le Vesinet, Seine-et-Oise. In this last stage one scarcely notices the faint traces of facets which show that this hache has passed through all the preceding stages. Two-ninths actual size.
The arrival of the Neolithic cultures and industries in western Europe marks one of the most profound changes in all prehistory and introduces us to a new period which must be treated in an entirely different historic spirit. This new era began between 7,000 to 10,000 years ago, or with the close of the Daun stage, the last geologic feature of Postglacial times.
There are two theories regarding the close of Upper Palæolithic and the beginning of Neolithic times. The older theory, which still has some adherents, is that the Upper Palæolithic races and industries suddenly gave way before the arrival of new and superior races bringing in the Neolithic culture. The newer theory is that there are evidences of gradual transfusions from the Upper Palæolithic into the Neolithic cultures and that these are found in some of the oldest Neolithic sites.
Fig. 264. Stone hatchet, or tranchet, from the type station of Campigny, after Salmon, d'Ault du Mesnil, and Capitan. One-half actual size.
Fig. 265. Stone pick, or pic, from the type station of Campigny, after Salmon, d'Ault du Mesnil, and Capitan. About one-half actual size.
In 1898 there appeared an article[(21)] by Philippe Salmon, d'Ault du Mesnil, and Capitan, entitled, "Le Campignien," defending the theory of an early and transitional Neolithic stage, the Campignian.[(22)] The type station of this early culture was pointed out by Salmon in 1886; it lies a little more than a mile northwest of the village of Blangy, on the River Bresle, on a site well placed for natural defense. The remains of the hut-dwellings of this camp and of various industrial objects appear to indicate that this station belongs to the earliest phase of the Neolithic Period. These Campignians owe little to the culture or industry of the races which previously occupied this region of western Europe; they are entire strangers, purely Neolithic in type.
While this is the age of polished, as distinguished from chipped, stone, the axe (hache) of polished stone is still very rare in the Campignian. There prevail flaked flint types common to all the previous stages of the Stone Age, such as the knives (couteaux), planers (grattoirs), and spear or dart heads (pointes de sagaie), but we notice the appearance of two entirely new flint implements: first, the triangular knife or stone hatchet (tranchet), of the type (Fig. 264) common in the Danish kitchen-middens; this knife has a broad, sharp cutting edge flaked on one side; second (Fig. 265), there is a sort of elongated axe or pick (pic) with chipped sides and an end more or less conical in shape.[(23)] These people also made use of large flakes of flint. If we regard the Campignian as a prolonged industrial stage in northern Europe, it certainly precedes the appearance of abundant axe heads of polished flint. In France it seems to appear occasionally as a local phase of the Neolithic.