have seen that in Neolithic times they were acquainted with the
use of the distaff. In the Bronze Age they manufactured woolen
cloth. We have but few specimens of this cloth, because it is
under only very exceptional circumstances that woolen fabrics can
be preserved for any great length of time. From examinations of
burial mounds of this period, it would appear that the better
class of people were clad in linen and woolen. Probably the use
of the skins of animals for dress purposes was mostly
discontinued during this age. Woolen cloaks of this period have
been found in Denmark, though probably dating from near the
close.
Ornamental Designs. Bronze Sickle.
In agriculture we detect only such advances as improved
implements would suggest. They used the sickle in gathering in
the harvest. We find no implements which we are sure were used
for agricultural purposes. Yet they must have had some means of
preparing the ground for the cereals. The day of wild animals was
gone. In the lake settlements of this age the domestic animals
outnumbered the wild species.16
During this age the horse was used for riding and driving, and
oxen were used for plowing.
The proof of this fact is certain sketches found in Denmark. But
the use of bronze in that country continued after iron had been
introduced in the south of Europe. Pottery was more carefully
made—though the wheel for turning it was not yet introduced. The
shapes were varied and elegant; sometimes, instead of having a
flat base, they came to a point below—in which case they had to
be placed in a support before they could stand upright. Nearly
all the pottery bears the ornamentation peculiar to the Bronze
Age—that is, straight lines, dots, etc.
Clay Vessel and Support. Bronze Weapons.
During this age, the inhabitants were as much given to war and
conquest as any rudely civilized people: we, therefore, meet with
remains of their weapons. The principal ones were swords,
daggers, spear-heads, and arrows. The swords are always more or
less leaf-like in shape, double-edged, sharp-pointed, and
intended more for stabbing and thrusting, rather than cutting. No
hand guards were used.
Sometimes the handles were fastened to the swords by means of
rivets; and, at other times, the handle was plaited with wood or
bone. They are of different lengths, intermediate between the
sword and the dagger. It is doubtful whether they made use of
shields.
Bronze shields are, indeed, found; but, from the ornaments and
other circumstances they are generally considered to belong to
the Iron Age: for we shall subsequently learn that the
introduction of iron did not prevent the continued use of bronze.
The bow was well known; and this must have necessitated the use
of arrows. Some bronze arrows have been found; but a flint arrow
is nearly as serviceable as bronze, and much cheaper, so we may
be sure they were more common. They also employed spears and
javelins, and the bronze heads of these weapons are found in
various places. The invading Celt found many camps and fortified
places already in existence, and continued them in use after the
original occupant had been driven away.
Mold.
As we have spent some time in learning the different objects
manufactured out of bronze, it may be of interest to learn
somewhat of their methods of working bronze. We have already
stated how the amateur worker in bronze would follow on after the
trader—and so the objects of bronze would be made in all the
countries of Europe. Molds have been found in various places.
This is a mold for casting the axes having a socket in which to
put the handle. It was found in the cave at Heathbury Burn,
already mentioned. None of the bronze objects were forged out, as
a smith forges out objects of iron—they were cast. In the absence
of steel, it would be almost impossible to cut bronze; hence it
was necessary to make the casting as nearly perfect as possible.
Sometimes the molds were cut out of stone, as in the figure just
given. The molds themselves were, in this case, difficult to
make; besides, they could scarcely be made so perfect as not to
leave a little ridge, where the two halves of the mold came
together, which, as just explained, owing to the absence of
steel, it would be very difficult to remove. In process of time
they discovered an easier way of making the molds, that employed
at the present day—that is, by the use of sand. The ridge would
still remain, and is to be plainly seen on specimens of ancient
bronze.
To overcome the difficulty just mentioned, they invented a third
method of casting, which displays great ingenuity. A model of the
object desired was made of wood or wax, and inclosed in prepared
earth mixed with some inflammable material, in order that, when
subjected to heat, it might become porous. The whole was then
heated until the wax or wood disappeared. The mold was then ready
for use. The great advantage of this method was that there were
no projecting lines of junction to disfigure the complete
implement. This seems to have been the most common method
employed. This explains the fact, that we seldom find any two
bronze objects exactly similar to one another. Any impression
left on the wax model would be faithfully reproduced. Marks of
the spatula, with which the wax was worked, are frequently found;
and, in one case, the impression of the human finger was
observed.17
A people as highly cultured as those of the Bronze Age must have
had some system of government, and one that was a sensible
advance over the government of the Neolithic people. In the
Neolithic Age it was, doubtless, tribe against tribe.
Confederacies, the union of several tribes for common purpose of
defense, must have been more common at this age.18 The first
Aryan tribes to arrive in Europe, as we have seen, were the
Celts. In time, they had to withstand the pressure of invasion
themselves. The Belgae, and other Germanic tribes, were also on
the move. But war at this period would partake more of the nature
of people against people, than of tribe against tribe. The civil
and the military departments of government must have taken more
definite shape, and we are not without evidence of fairly
organized and disciplined forces. As early as two thousand eight
hundred years before Christ, the sea-coast people of Europe,
while yet in the Bronze Age, allied their forces for the conquest
of Egypt.19
We have referred to the influence of trade in shaping
civilization. It is commerce that to-day is carrying civilization
to remote corners of the globe. Long before the dawn of history,
it was an active agent in advancing culture. It is important to
note the great expanse of commerce, both inland and marine, which
prevailed during the Bronze Age. An important article of trade
was, of course, bronze. The people who first learned the secret
of its manufacture would speedily find a demand for their wares
from surrounding tribes, and we have already pointed out how this
trade would quickly give rise to local manufactures. But, to
produce bronze, we know tin is just as necessary as copper—and
all the countries of Europe are not provided with these metals;
so more or less trade would inevitably take place. In various
ways the stores of the bronze merchant might be lost, and only
revealed in after years by accident. One of these deposits, found
in France, is evidently the store of a merchant or trader from
Etruria to the tribes of the north and west, and so gives us a
quite vivid idea of the trade of that early time. It consisted of
over four hundred articles of bronze, “comprising knives,
sickles, lance-heads, horse-bits, rings, buttons, pendants, and
bracelets.”20
As an article of adornment, amber was highly prized, not only by
the people of Europe during the Bronze Age, but also by the
people of the preceding Neolithic Age. This caused a trade to
spring up which certainly did its share in enlightening the
people. The main supply must have been obtained from the shores
of the Baltic. That the trade was of importance is evidenced by
the fact that amber has been found scattered over Europe in the
tombs of the Neolithic and Bronze Ages.
We have given a passing glance at the religion of each age we
have examined. It must be confessed that great uncertainty hangs
over the results. From a close examination of their industries,
we can gather considerable as to the home life and general
enlightenment of prehistoric times. A knowledge of religious
belief is gathered mainly from a study of their burial customs.
This is a very important part of our investigation, because a
religious belief is one of the exponents of the culture of a
people.
We have seen that in the Neolithic Age the dead were buried
surrounded by implements, weapons, and ornaments for use in the
future life. The descendants of these people throughout Europe,
even in the Bronze Age, would still continue this custom. The
implements buried with the body were more often of stone than
bronze. We must constantly bear in mind that bronze was costly.
This will explain its absence in many cases. It is interesting to
note in this connection that these are “cases in which it is
evident that flint implements were deposited in graves rather in
deference to ancient customs than because they were still in
every-day use.”21 We also notice that during this age, often the
objects placed in the graves were, from their shape, obviously
not intended for daily use. This would clearly indicate that the
popular mind became impressed with the fact that these votive
offerings, however freely given, could be of no assistance to the
departed, but they still continued the custom because it was
sanctioned by usage of past years.
But the dead were not always buried during the Bronze Age, nor,
indeed, as a general rule. The invading race doubtless brought
with them a new religion. Many of the ornamentations on their
swords, vases, and other articles, are supposed by some writers
to be religious symbols. From the frequent occurrence of the
circle, and combinations of circles, it has been suggested that
they worshiped the sun. And the occurrence of customs observable
even at a late day, in various portions of Europe, as pointed out
by Prof. Nelson, show that the worship of the fire-god, or the
sun, was once widely extended in Europe.22 On this point we are
further told: “That even as late as the time of Canute the
Great,23 there is a statute forbidding the adorement of the sun
and the moon.”24 So it is not strange that in the new faith a
different method of burial would be followed. That was by
cremation. “The dead were burned, were purified by being passed
through the fire along with their possessions.”25 The ashes was
then gathered together and placed in urns and burial mounds and
barrows. The votive offerings of flint and bronze articles in
daily use were also thrown in the fire, and their burnt remains
placed with the other ashes in the burial urn. The cut is that of
a bell-shaped barrow of the Bronze Age.
Burial Mound.
We have just seen what inferences have been drawn from the use of
the circle as an ornament. This is not the only sign that has
been thought to have some symbolical meaning. The cross was also
used as an ornament, and possessed probably some religious
significance. A third figure which has caused some discussion was
the triangle. “It is, on the whole, very probable that all these
signs, which are not connected with any known object, bear some
relation to certain religious or superstitious ideas entertained
by the men of the Bronze epoch, and, as a consequence of this,
that their hearts must have been inspired with some degree of
religious feeling.”26
Avebury Restored.
We have mentioned the use of stone circles in Neolithic times.
During the Bronze Age they built the circle very large, sometimes
twelve hundred feet in diameter, and they were sometimes made of
earth. These circles are regarded by some27 as being simply
burial places, and many of them have been proved to be such. But
others regard them as temples, meaning thereby not a building, in
our sense of the word, but a place of sanctity, and probably
where some form of worship was held. Even if we allow that they
were originally tombs in every case, it does not follow that they
have not also been temples, for the religious sentiment has, in
all ages, and in all places, tended to center in tombs, which
ultimately have become places of worship. Many of our Christian
Churches have originated in this manner, and it is a most obvious
transition from the tomb to the temple. The worship of the
spirits of the dead at the one would naturally grow into the
worship of the Great Unknown in the other.28
The preceding cut is a restoration of one of the largest of these
temples. Here we see a circle twelve hundred feet in diameter, of
upright stones, guarded by both a ditch and embankment. From the
two openings in the embankment formerly extended two long winding
avenues of stone. Between them rises Silbury Hill, the largest
artificial mound in Great Britain, being one hundred and thirty
feet high. The area of the large inclosure was about twenty-eight
and a half acres. This was a temple of no inconsiderable size. It
was, of course in ruins when the earliest account of it was
written, and we can only speculate as to the lapse of time since
it was venerated as a place of worship.
Stonehenge, on Salisbury Plain, is a better known ruin, though
not on as large a scale as at Avebury. The cut gives us a
restoration of it. The outer circle of standing stones is one
hundred feet in diameter, and when entire consisted of one
hundred stones. These are of sandstone, and were obtained in the
vicinity. A course of stone was laid along the top. We notice
within a smaller circle of stone. The material of these stones is
such that we know they must have come from a distance. Mr. James
tells us that they are erratic—that is, bowlders brought from the
North of Scotland by the glaciers—and that others of the same
kind are still to be seen lying around the country.29 But the
more common opinion is that they were brought there by the people
from a distance, perhaps Cornwall or the Channel Islands. If this
be true, it is evidence of a strong religious feeling, and a
peculiar value must have been attached to the material, since for
any ordinary monument the stones in the neighborhood would have
sufficed. Still nearer the center were five groups of three great
stones each, and immediately within these a horseshoe of smaller
stones. Finally, near the head of the horseshoe, a great slab of
sandstone is supposed to have served for an altar. The date of
the two structures just described has been a matter of some
dispute.
Stonehenge Restored.
It is worthy of notice that in the immediate neighborhood of both
of them are found a great number of barrows of the Bronze Age.
Over three hundred were erected in the neighborhood of the
latter. In the opinion of many this fixes their date in the
Bronze Age. Stonehenge, in its ruined state, has formed the
subject of no little speculation. Modern explorers, in connecting
it with the Bronze Age, have not dispelled from it the
enchantment of mystery. We must ever wonder as to the nature of
the rites there observed. Our questionings meet with but feeble
response; for though we have learned somewhat of past times, it
is comparatively but little. Ruined columns, crumbling burial
mounds, and remains of stone and bronze will always be surrounded
with more or less mystery—a striking illustration that science is
able to dispel but little of the darkness which unnumbered years
have thrown around the culture of the past.
Ancient Tower, Scotland. REFERENCES
The manuscript of this chapter was submitted to Prof. Chas.
Rau, of the Smithsonian Institution for criticism.
Brace’s “Races of the Old World,” p. 60.
Brace’s “Races of the Old World,” p. 61.
Dawkins’s “Early Man in Britain,” p. 343.
“One mass estimated to weigh two hundred tons.” Dana’s “Manual
of Mineralogy,” p. 291.
Evans’s “Ancient Bronze Implements,” p. 2.
Rau’s “Anthropological Subjects,” p. 89. In his preface to this
collection he asserts his belief, that “former inhabitants of
North America, notwithstanding all assertions to the contrary,
were unacquainted with the art of melting copper.” Ibid., vii.
Dawkins’s “Early Man in Britain,” p. 401.
“Dawn of History,” p. 367.
For an excellent discussion of this subject, about which there
is yet much uncertainty, we would refer the reader to Evans’s
“Ancient Bronze Implements,” chap. xxii.
Dawkins’s “Early Man in Britain,” p. 355.
Dawkins’s “Early Man in Britain,” p. 350.
“Prehistoric Times,” p. 34.
“Early Man in Britain,” p. 351.
Figuier’s “Primitive Man,” p. 255.
Rau’s “Early Man in Europe,” p. 135, and note.
Lubbock’s “Prehistoric Times,” p. 39.
Morgan’s “Ancient Society,” pp. 119, 120.
Dawkins’s “Early Man in Europe,” p. 449.
Dawkins’s “Early Man in Britain,” p. 383.
Lubbock’s “Prehistoric Times,” p. 157.
Lubbock’s “Prehistoric Times,” p. 74.
A.D., 995-1035.
Ferguson’s “Rude Stone Monuments.”
Dawkins’s “Early Man in Britain,” p. 367.
Figuier’s “Primitive Man,” p. 283.
Ferguson’s “Rude Stone Monuments.”
Dawkins’s “Early Man in Britain,” p. 377.
James’s “Stonehenge,” p. 3.
Chapter VIII
THE IRON AGE IN EUROPE.
Bronze not the best metal—Difficulties attending the discovery of
Iron—Probable steps in this discovery—Where this discovery was
first made—Known in ancient Egypt—How this knowledge would
spread—Iron would not drive out Bronze—The primitive
Iron-worker—The advance in government—Pottery and ornaments of
the Iron Age,—Weapons of early Iron Age—The battle-field at
Tilfenan—Trade of early Iron Age—Invention of Money—Invention of
Alphabetic Writing—Invasion of the Germanic Tribes—The cause of
the Dark Ages—Connection of these three Ages—Necessity of
believing in an extended past—Attempts to determine the
same—Tinière Delta—Lake Bienne, British Fen-beds—Maximum and
Minimum data—Argument from the widespread dispersion of the
Turanian Race—Mr. Geikie’s conclusions—The isolation of the
Paleolithic Age.
Theintroduction of bronze was the harbinger of better days to the
various tribes of Europe. Without metals it is doubtful if man
would ever have been able to raise himself from barbarism. His
advance in civilization has been in direct proportion to his
ability to work metals. As long as he knew how to work bronze
only he could not hope for the best results. The trouble was not
in the metal itself, but in the supply; for copper and tin, the
constituents of bronze, are found only in limited amounts. When
we reflect on the multiplicity of purposes for which some
metallic substance is needed, we at once perceive that men
require a metal which can not only be worked cheaply, but must
exist in great abundance, so that the needs of a rich and varied
culture may be met.
The Divine Author of nature has stored away just such a metal,
and in such exhaustless quantities that it forms an ingredient in
nearly all soils, and flows away in the waters of many springs
and rivers. It exists in abundance in nearly every country of the
globe, in some forming veritable mountain masses. We refer to
iron, the king of metals; and when man had learned to reduce it
from its ores he had taken the first step in a new direction, the
end whereof is yet far distant.
We have in the preceding chapter presented some reasons why
copper would be known before iron. In the first place, how were
men to learn there was such a thing as iron? Supposing its ores
did occur in abundance, there was nothing to attract attention to
them. They were not of great heft, like tin ore or of striking
color, like the ores of copper. In the hills, and under the foot
of man, nature indeed had imprisoned a genius; but there was no
outward sign by which man was to divine his presence. Copper, as
we have seen, occurs frequently in a native form that is ready
for use, without reducing from its ores. Native iron, on the
contrary, is almost the rarest of substances, though it is
reported as occurring in one or two localities on the earth.1
Almost the only examples of native iron has been obtained from
meteorites. Strange as it may seem, these wanderers in space,
which occasionally flame athwart the sky, consist largely of pure
iron; at least this is true of such specimens as have from time
to time been found on the earth’s surface. This supply is of
course extremely limited, yet some Siberian tribes are said to
make knives from iron obtained in this manner.2 Moreover the
evidence of language, as used by the ancient Greeks and
Egyptians, would imply the meteoric origin of the first known
form of the metal.3 But though such accidental finds might prove
the existence of another metal, they would furnish no hint how to
extract it from its ores, or indeed, that it existed in the form
of ores.
The prolonged schooling in metallurgy, which men received during
the Bronze Age, could not fail to give them many hints, and
doubtless accidental discoveries of metallic substances were
made. We can conceive how, by accident or design, iron ore,
treated in a similar manner to copper and tin ore, would leave
behind a mass of spongy iron. The difficulty would be in working
it; for, as we have seen, they were in the habit of casting their
articles of bronze. But iron is very difficult of fusion. It was
a long while before they learned how to do that. They had
therefore to learn an entirely new art—that is, to fashion their
implements of iron by hammering the heated mass.
There is no reason to suppose that iron was first discovered in
Europe. Its spread has been from the east and south to the north
and west. It, in all probability, was discovered, like bronze, in
Asia. Although evidence, both archæological and traditional, goes
to show that bronze was in use long before iron, yet iron has
been known from time immemorial. Explain it how we will,
civilization and history follow close after the knowledge of
iron. Wherever the light of history first falls on the nations of
the Old World, we find them acquainted with iron, but such
knowledge, at least on the part of the Mediterranean nations,
does not long precede history, for at that early time, iron was
still a most precious metal. It was not yet produced in
sufficient quantities to take the place of bronze; hence the
prehistoric Iron Age was there but of short duration.
Among the early Egyptians iron was known, but was probably not
very common. There is on this subject some diversity of opinion;
some believing that at the very earliest historical period they
were skilled in working it, and employed it in all the affairs of
life, but others assure us that at the most ancient period they
did not really use iron, and that bronze was the metal employed
for all ordinary purposes.4
A wedge of iron is said to have been found in a joint between the
stones of the great pyramid. Here, then, at the dawn of historic
times iron seems to be making its way among a bronze-using
people. The ancient Chaldeans employed iron as an ornament, but
not for implements. With them it was therefore a precious metal.
Among the Assyrians, iron was largely used, and at a
comparatively early date. A careful study of the poems of Homer
shows that the Greeks of nearly three thousand years ago had a
knowledge of iron, though it was a highly prized metal. But to
the north of the Mediterranean the prehistoric Iron Age was of
longer duration.
We can readily see that a knowledge of iron would spread in much
the same way as did bronze. When first introduced, it would be
rare and costly, and so would be used sparingly. Bronze axes have
been found with the edge of iron. Afterwards, as it became more
abundant, it would be used altogether for cutting instruments and
weapons, while bronze, being more easily worked, would still be
used for ornaments, brooches, etc. At Hallstadt, in Austria, was
discovered a cemetery which evidently belongs to a time when iron
was taking the place of bronze. In this case, the implements of
bronze are those forms which we have learned were produced near
the close of the Bronze Age. The iron implements are not those
forms best suited for that metal, but imitations of those of
bronze.5 We remember when bronze was first introduced, the
weapons were simply copies of those forms already made in stone.6
We may suppose that a knowledge of iron would spread rapidly. The
knowledge of metallurgy necessary for the production of bronze
was at this time widely disseminated. It would require,
therefore, but a hint to start them in experiments. In the
dissemination of this knowledge, commerce, of course, played a
most important part. Whenever the early Greek and Roman writers
have occasion to mention the arms of the less civilized tribes of
Europe, we learn they were of iron. This shows that at a very
early time this knowledge had spread all over Europe.7
It is scarcely necessary to remark that the use of iron would not
drive out the use of bronze. That would still be used for many
purposes; and even stone would continue in use, at least for some
purposes. At the battle of Marathon, arrow-heads and lances of
stone were largely used. We can easily understand how, by one of
a number of causes, some rude tribes, yet unacquainted with the
use of metal, would come to occupy the site of some settlement,
the inhabitants of which had been in the Bronze or Iron Age. This
actually happened at ancient Troy, where the remains of a
stone-using folk have been found above those of a people using
metal. This, though an exception to the general rule, need give
us no surprise.
Iron manufacture at the present day, is one of our great
industries. In its present form it is the final development of an
industry whose first unfoldings we have now to glance at. That
the first process man employed to procure iron should have been
very rude, is what we would expect. Some of the partially
civilized tribes of to-day may give us an insight into the
process employed. We are told that in Tartary each native makes
the iron he needs, just as every household would make its own
bread. The furnace is a very small affair, not holding more than
three pounds of ore. This is filled with ore and charcoal. The
bellows are used, and after the charcoal is all burned out, the
result is a small piece of spongy iron, which needs only repeated
heating and hammering to be made serviceable.8 Primitive
furnaces, on a somewhat larger scale, have been discovered in
Switzerland. Here the excavation was made in the side of a hill,
and a rude, dome-shaped chimney built over it.
We must not forget that our task ends where the historian’s
begins. The use of iron did not long precede history, so we have
but little to describe as to the customs and manners of life
during the prehistoric Iron Age. A general advance in all the
social arts must surely have taken place. Improved tools, and
more cheaply produced, could not fail to advance man very
materially in culture. Some lake settlements were still in use as
places of residence, but better means of protection than water
was now known—walled cities were in use, especially around the
Mediterranean sea.
Mr. Morgan has traced for us the evolution of government. At this
early date the Greek and Roman people were engaged in
substituting for ancient society the modern idea of government
founded on territory.9 The great body of European tribes were now
in the final stage of barbaric life. Their system of government
was doubtless the highest known to ancient society— that of
confederacies; the union of tribes speaking dialects of the same
language, for offensive and defensive purposes.
Ornaments and Gold Ornament.
As characteristic of the advance of this epoch, we may mention
the appearance of pottery made on the potter’s wheel, and baked
in an improved kind of furnace. Previous to this epoch all the
pottery had been moulded by hand and baked in an imperfect manner
in the open air. This may be thought to be but a small
improvement. Our civilization, however, depends upon small
improvements. Only during the early part of this age, while iron
was scarce, and therefore valuable, would it be used for the
purpose of ornaments. Iron brooches have been found in
considerable quantities in the lake settlements. Bronze would
still be the principal article used for ornaments. The articles
of bronze manufactured play a great deal of skill. Nor was gold
entirely forgotten. The cap-shaped ornament of gold was found in
Ireland. During the Bronze age, as we have seen, there was no
attempt made to represent animal forms by way of ornaments; but
we meet with such representations during the early part of the
Iron Age. This shows how they ornamented the sheath of a sword
found in one of the Swiss lakes.
Swords and Ornamental Sword Sheath.
The warriors of the early Iron Age possessed leaf-shaped swords
for stabbing. The hilts were of bronze. This period was a
struggle for existence, on the part of the various tribes of
Europe. War must have been very common, so it is not strange that
a large number of relics of this age are of warlike implements.
Lance-heads, javelins, and arrow-heads have been found in
abundance. It appears, from experiments ordered by the Emperor
Napoleon III, that the javelins could only have been used as
missile weapons, and that they were thrown, not by the hand
merely grasping the shaft, but by means of a cord or thong,
something after the principle of a sling.10
Some years ago an old battle-field was discovered at Tiefenau, in
Switzerland. On it were found a great number of objects made of
iron, such as fragments of chariots, bits for horses, wheels,
pieces of coats of mail, and arms of various sorts, including no
less than a hundred two-handed swords. All of these were made of
iron.11 The soldiers also carried with them shields, made
sometimes of bronze, as in the cut below, or of wood, studded
with iron.
Lance-head and Javelin, and Shields.
There is evidence of considerable volume of trade at this time.
The Mediterranean was the theater of an extended commerce.
Phœnician sailors not only ventured to brave the Mediterranean
sea, but carried their vessels out on the Atlantic at as early a
date as 500 B.C. The Greek traders were also active. Massilia, or
as it is known in modern times, Marseilles, was the seat of a
thriving trade. African ivory has been found in the tombs of
Hallstadt, in Austria, in connection with ornaments of amber from
the Baltic, and gold from Transylvania. The inhabitants of this
town possessed in their salt mines the source of a lucrative
trade. The trader of the Iron Age was able to take an immense
stride by reason of the invention of money. Heretofore, in
Europe, we have not met with coins, and trade must have been
carried on by means of barter.
Gallic Coin.
Acquainted as we are at the present day with money and the
mechanism of exchange, it is difficult to see how any extended
trade could be carried on without some unit of value, yet no
coins are known earlier than the Iron Age.12 The most ancient
coins known are Greek, and date back to the eighth century before
Christ. This coin is one found in one of the lake settlements. It
is made of bronze, and the figures are not stamped, but obtained
by melting and casting.13 This, however, is not a Greek coin, but
a Gallic one. On the battlefield of Tiefenau, mentioned above,
several Greek coins, struck at Massilia, were found.14
It is scarcely necessary to point out, that though iron gives its
name to this age, it by no means follows that the only difference
between this and the Bronze Age is the use of iron. “The pottery
is different, the forms of the implements and weapons are
different, the ornamentation is different, the knowledge of
metallurgy was more advanced, silver and lead were in use,
letters had been invented, coins had been struck.”15 That
wonderful invention, the phonetic alphabet, was made during the
early part of this age. The past was no longer simply kept alive
in the memory of the living, handed down by tradition and song.
Inscriptions, and monuments, and books abounded, and we are no
longer confined to an inspection of their handiwork, or
examination of their habitations, and explanation of ancient
burial mounds for our knowledge of their life and surroundings.
It is no longer the archæologists’ collections, but the writings
of the historian that unfolds past times and customs.
Let us cast a glance at the condition of Europe at the dawn of
history. We have seen that in general terms the Bronze Age
coincided with the arrival and spread of the Celts, though the
earlier Celts were still Neolithic. The use of iron could
scarcely have been inaugurated before the innumerable hordes of
the Germanic tribes, probably driven from their Asiatic homes by
the presence of invading people, were on the march. The world
has, perhaps, never witnessed such a movement of people as
convulsed Europe for several hundred years, beginning the second
century before Christ and continuing until the fall of the
Western Empire of Rome. The light of history dawns on a stormy
scene in Europe. The Celts confined to the Western portion had
been largely subjected by the Roman armies, but the largest
portion of Europe held by the Germanic tribes was the seat from
whence assault after assault was made on the Roman Empire, which
at length, weakened by internal dissensions and enervated by
luxury, split in twain, and the western, and most important part,
fell before its barbarian foes.
The various tribes could not keep alive the civilization they had
overthrown. The wandering hordes of Germanic people could not
easily forget their former barbaric life, their marches of
conquest, and careers of pillage. But the claims of civilization,
though light and pleasant, are none the less imperative, and a
people who seek her rewards must form settled communities,
develop public spirit, organize government, and sink the
individual in the public good. Not appreciating these claims, it
is not strange that the incipient civilization nearly expired,
and that the night of the Dark Ages enwrapt Europe. From out that
darkness, composed of the descendants of the people whose culture
we have been investigating, finally emerged the mediæval nations
of Europe.
The review has been a pleasant one, for it is a record of
progress. The difference between the culture of the Neolithic and
the Iron Age is great, but it is simply a development, the result
of a gradual growth. Civilization and history have only hastened
this growth. If we look around us to-day we can trace the
elements of our civilization back through the eras of history,
and though the faint beginning of some can be noticed, yet many
of them come down to us from prehistoric times. We have treated
of these early people in the three stages of culture known as the
Neolithic, Bronze, and Iron Ages. We have seen there is no hard
and fast line dividing the different stages of culture. To borrow
the words of another, these stages of progress, like the three
principal colors of the rainbow, overlap, intermingle, and shade
off the one into the other, and yet in the main they are well
defined.16
We instinctively long to set bounds to the past, to measure it by
the unit of years. It affords us satisfaction to give dates for
events long since gone by. For any event in the domain of
history, it is natural and appropriate to gratify this desire. It
gives precision to our thoughts, and more firmly fixes the march
of events. But the historical portion of human life on the globe
is but a small part of the grand whole. When we pass beyond
history, or into prehistoric times, we find ourselves utterly at
a loss as to dates.
We have referred in the preceding pages to the commonly accepted
belief of a few years ago, that, at most, a few thousand years
express the whole period of human life on the globe. This was
supposed to be the teaching of the Scriptures, but Infinite
Wisdom left not only his word, but he left an imperishable record
of the past in rocky strata and excavated valley, in dripping
caves and mountain masses. When it was seen that the claims of
geology for a greatly extended past, one transcending the powers
of the human mind to conceive its length, could no longer be
successfully denied, then it was that earnest investigators in
the field of human antiquity could no longer shut their eyes to
the fact that if geological evidence were worth any thing, man
must have existed in the world for a far longer time than one
covered by the brief period hitherto relied on.
This truth is so patent and plain that it has received the
unqualified indorsement of the most learned scholars.
Distinguished divines have been amongst its able expounders, and
instead of being in opposition to the Bible, as already stated,
the earnest reader finds in the periods of the geologists
unexpected confirmation of its truths. The evidence of an
extended past for man is not, however, wholly of a geological
nature, though these have been the ones principally relied on.
The archæologist to-day summons to his aid the science of
language, studies into the origin of civilization and the
comparison of the different races of men, and derives from each
and all of these concurrent testimony as to a vast, shadowy, and
profound antiquity for man, one stretching way beyond the dawn of
history, far into the very night of time.
As we have now spent some time in tracing out the culture of
these early ages, it may be well to see if there are any means at
our command to determine the absolute chronology of the various
ages. At the very outset of our inquiry, we shall perceive that
we have no such class of facts as guided our investigations into
the age of the Paleolithic remains. We have but to recall the
situation in which the implements of that age were found, always
under such circumstances, that we see at once that a great lapse
of time has passed since they became imbedded where found, and
then the bones of the various extinct animals, found so
associated with the implements, that we are justified, even
compelled, to admit they occupied the same section of country,
and then, from a variety of causes, we are satisfied that they
occupied Europe at the close of the Glacial Age, if not for long
ages before. All this gave us a point of departure, and we have
showed with what care scholars have studied all questions
relating to the date of the Glacial Age.
But aside from the fact that geology points out that a long time
went by after the close of the Glacial Age before Neolithic man
arrived on the scene, we are largely deprived of its aid in our
investigations; for all the various implements and specimens of
the household industries, from which we derive our knowledge of
these latter ages, are found only in surface deposits; that is,
in the modern alluvia and silt of river bottoms, in superficial
deposits, in caves, and in peat-bogs; and even in other instances
where apparently deeply buried, as in the submerged forest
deposits of the British coasts, we know that, geologically
speaking, their age is recent.
But in spite of these difficulties, attempts have been made from
time to time to determine the absolute chronology of these ages.
The results, however, can only be considered as approximations of
the truth. We will call attention to some of these calculations.
Their value to us consists in showing us the methods by which
this problem has been attacked, and not in the results obtained.
M. Morlot, of Switzerland, has sought to determine this question
by a study of the delta of the Tinière, which is a small river
flowing into the lake of Geneva. Like all mountain streams, it
brings down considerable quantities of sediment, with which it
has formed a conical shaped delta. Cuttings for a railroad
exposed a fine section of this cone, and showed that at three
different times layers of vegetable soil, which must once have
been its old surface were found.
The lowest surface was some twenty feet beneath the present
surface, and here were found relics of the Stone Age. The second
layer was at the depth of ten feet, and contained relics of the
Bronze Age. Finally the first buried layer, three feet beneath
the present surface, was found to contain relics of the Roman
Age. Obtaining from other data the time that has elapsed since
the deposits of the Roman layer, he readily calculates the age of
the Stone and Bronze layers. By this means he obtains for the
Bronze Age an antiquity of between three and four thousand years,
and for the Neolithic Age from five to seven thousand years.17 M.
Morlot does not claim for his calculation more than approximate
accuracy.18 But if we were to allow it a greater accuracy than
its author claims, it would still only show us that from a period
of from five to seven thousand years ago, tribes of stone using
folks lived in Switzerland. It tells us nothing as to their first
appearance, or the total length of this age.19
Other calculations of a similar nature have been made. The Lake
of Bienne, in Switzerland, has been gradually silting up along
its margins from time immemorial. About seven hundred and fifty
years ago there was an abbey built at one place on the then
existing shore of the lake. Since that time the gain of land has
been about twelve hundred feet. A considerable distance further
up the valley are found the remains of a lake settlement of the
Stone Age. If the gain of land has been uniform, it has not been
far from seven thousand years since the lake washed round the
ancient settlement. Of course the land may have gained faster at
one time than at another, but from the general configuration of
the valley it is considered that its gain was regular.20
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.
Chapter IX
EARLY MAN IN AMERICA.1
Conflicting accounts of the American Aborigines—Recent
discoveries—Climate of California in Tertiary Times—Geological
changes near its close—Description of Table Mountain—Results of
the discoveries there—The Calaveras skull—Other relics—Discussion
of the question—Early Californians Neolithic—Explanation of
this—Date of the Pliocene Age—Other discoveries bearing on the
Antiquity of man—Dr. Koch’s discovery—Discoveries in the Loess of
Nebraska—In Greene County, Ill.— In Georgia—Difficulties in
detecting a Paleolithic Age in this country—Dr. Abbott’s
discoveries—Paleolithic Implements of the Delaware—Age of the
deposits—The race of Paleolithic man—Ancestors of the
Eskimos—Comparison of Paleolithic Age in this country with that
in Europe—Eskimos one of the oldest races in the World.
When the energy and skill of Columbus were crowned with success,
and the storm-tossed Atlantic was found to lave the shores of a
western continent, reflecting minds in Europe were much
interested in the strange stories they heard of the inhabitants
of the New World. On the one hand Spanish adventurers told
scarcely credited stories of populous cities, temples glittering
with gold and silver ornaments, and nations possessed of a
barbaric civilization scarcely inferior to their own. On the
other hand were accounts of morose savages, cruel and vindictive
in nature, depending on fishing and the chase for a livelihood.
Nearly four centuries have elapsed since that time. The
aboriginal inhabitants have nearly disappeared, leaving their
origin and prehistoric life almost as great a riddle to us as it
was to the early colonists.
But in endeavoring to unroll the pages of their history, we have
chanced upon some strange discoveries. The Aztecs, that people
whose culture is to-day such an enigma to our scholars, are known
to be a late arrival in the valley of Anahuac. They were preceded
in that section by a mysterious people, the Toltecs, whose
remains excite our liveliest curiosity, but of which we have yet
learned but little. Yucatan is shown to have been for many
centuries the home of a people whose advancement equated that of
the Aztecs at their palmiest day. Like important discoveries
attended the labors of explorers in the North. The entire valley
of its great river is known to have been the home of a numerous
population, that, from the nature of their remains, we call the
Mound-builders. Who these people were, when and whence they came,
and whither they went, are questions whose solution is by no
means accomplished. Nor are such discoveries the only results. A
study of their institutions has done much in revealing the
constructions of ancient society, and thereby throwing light on
some mysterious chapters of man’s existence.
Of late years interest in the antiquity of man in America has
been reawaked by the discoveries of human remains in Pliocene
deposits in California, and the Glacial gravel of the Delaware at
Trenton, New Jersey. Before this it was supposed that we had no
authentic instance of human remains in America found under such
circumstances that it was necessary to assign to them a profound
antiquity. If these latter day discoveries be true, we can not
escape the conclusion that man lived in America at as early a
date as that indicated by any of the European explorations. Some
hold that the proof of his existence here in Pliocene times is
far more satisfactory than any evidence of his presence in Europe
during this time. There is something fascinating in this belief.
If some of the most eminent scientists of America are not
mistaken, man lived on our Pacific coast before the great
ice-sheets that pulverized the surface of the earth and dispersed
life before them came down from the north. He ranged along the
western rivers before the volcanic peaks of the Sierras were
uplifted, and his old hunting-grounds are to-day buried
underneath the greet lava flow which desolated ancient California
and Oregon. But this assertion has not been allowed to pass
undisputed, nor has it received the assent of all scientists.
We can easily understand why scholars subject all questions
relating to the first appearance of man to very careful scrutiny.
If a competent geologist should assert that he had found, in
undoubted Pliocene formations, bones of some species of animals
not hitherto suspected of living at that date, his statement
would be accepted as proof of the same. But in the case of man,
every circumstance is inquired into. It is but right that the
utmost care should be exercised in this direction. But, on the
other hand, we are not justified in demanding mathematical
demonstration in every case of the accuracy of a reported
discovery. Yet such seems to be the position of a portion of the
scientific world. For, although they willingly admit that man has
lived on the earth for a very long time indeed, they urge all
sorts of objections to extending that time into a past geological
age.
Accordingly, when Professor Whitney states as the result of many
years spent in the investigation of the Tertiary formation of
California, that he finds evidence of the existence of man in the
Pliocene Age, it is not strange that one part of the scientific
world listens incredulously to his statements, and are at once
ready to explain away the facts on which he relies. He may, of
course, be mistaken, for it is human to err, but his proofs are
sufficiently strong to convince some of the best scholars in
America. We can do no more than to lay the facts before the
reader and let him judge for himself.
We have seen what a genial climate prevailed in Europe during the
Tertiary Age. This must also have been true of California. A rich
and varied vegetation decked the land. The great trees of
California of our day then flourished in Greenland, Iceland, and
Western Europe. The cypress of the Southern States was then
growing in Alaska and other high northern latitudes. The climate
probably passed from a tropical one, in early Tertiary times, to
a milder or temperate one in Pliocene times. Amongst the animals
inhabiting America were three species of camels. Rhinoceroses,
mastodons, and elephants trooped over the land. Tigers and other
carnivore prowled in the forests. Herds of horse-like animals,
one scarcely distinguishable from our common horse, grazed in the
valleys, along with several species of deer. From the presence of
the old drainage beds, we know that majestic rivers rolled their
watery burden through the land. Such a country might well afford
a home for man if he were present.
To understand fully the course of events which now took place we
must venture on geological ground. The great Pacific Ocean, lying
to the west of America, is constantly exerting a lateral
pressure, which during Tertiary times showed its effect in the
uplifting of the great mountain ranges of the western coast.2
During late Tertiary times, as a counterpart to the upward
movement, a great subsidence commenced in the Pacific region.3
Doubtless many islands, some think an entire continent even,
disappeared beneath the waves. The completion of the various
mountain ranges left the coast firm and unyielding; hence, as it
could not bend before the fiery flood forced upward from below by
the downward motion just mentioned, it broke, and the torrent of
molten rock leaped out as a lava flow. In consequence of this,
near the close of Pliocene times, the surface of California and
Oregon, especially the north of California, became buried under
the lava and ashes of the most desolating volcanic outbreak that
the earth has ever known.
Let us now see what bearing this has on the question of the
antiquity of man. Scattered here and there throughout California
are numerous masses of basaltic lava, which appear as elevated
ridges, the softer strata around having been denuded away. They
have received the general name of Table Mountains. They have not
only been noted for their picturesque beauty, but miners long
since found that the gravels underneath the lava covering were
rich in gold. In Tuolumne County the Table Mountain is a flow of
lava which originated in lofty volcanoes several miles away.
It extends along the north side of the Stanilaus, which is a
small river flowing in a south-westerly course through the
county. The mountain is in the form of a ridge about two thousand
feet above the present level of the river. At one point the river
breaks through this ridge, which has been worn away for a
considerable distance. From this point the ridge appears as a
continuous mountain, stretching away to the south for a distance
of twenty miles, from where it crosses the river. “As seen from a
distance the Table Mountain reveals its origin at once, in the
contrast between the long, straight line of its upper edge and
the broken and curving ones which the eroded hills of the
auriferous strata everywhere exhibit. Its dark color and
comparative absence of trees and shrubs on its top and sides also
indicate very clearly that the materials of which it is composed
are very different from that of the surrounding hills.”4
This is the celebrated Table Mountain of Tuolumne County. It is
simply a vast flow of lava. It must have been a grand sight when
this river of fire came rolling down from its volcanic fount. Its
present position on top of an elevated ridge is a very singular
one. In explanation of that we arrive at some very important
conclusions, and we can not fail to be impressed with the fact
that countless ages have rolled away since that lava flood poured
down the mountain side. “No one can deny that a stream of melted
lava, running for forty miles down the slope of the Sierra, must
have sought and found a depression or valley in which to flow;
for it is impossible that it should have maintained for any
distance its position on the crest of a ridge.” Lava is about as
thick as molten iron, and would as surely seek some valley in
which to flow as would so much water. “The valley of the
Stanilaus, now two thousand feet deep, could not then have
existed; for this flow of lava is clearly seen to have crossed it
at one point.”
“The whole face of the country must, therefore, have undergone an
entire change since the eruption took place, during which this
mass of lava was poured out. The valley of the Stanilaus must
have then been occupied by a range of mountains. The same is true
of the other side, where now is the valley of Wood’s Creek; for
such ranges must have existed in order to form and wall in the
valley in which the current of lava flowed. There has been,
therefore, an amount of denudation during the period since this
volcanic mass took its position of not less than three or four
thousand feet of perpendicular depth, and this surprising series
of changes is not peculiar to one locality, but the whole slope
of the Sierras, through the gold region, is the scene of similar
volcanic outflows and subsequent remodeling of the surface into a
new series of reliefs and depressions.”5
Imaginary Section of Table Mountain.
In order to fully realize the change here spoken of, an imaginary
section of Table Mountains is here presented. Here we see the two
valleys on the sides, and the mass of lava covering the top of
the mountain. The dotted lines represent the position of the old
line of hills, which must once have inclosed the valley down
which coursed the fiery torrent.
We require to dwell on this, fact before we can fully understand
its meaning. The “eternal hills,” two and three thousand feet in
height, have been completely washed away, and where they stood is
now a deep valley. But the old valley, protected by its stony
covering, is now a mountain ridge; and this, we are told, is not
a solitary instance, but the entire surface of the country has
been thus denuded. We stand in awe before the stupendous results,
which nature, working through vast cycles of time, has
accomplished.
But if this lava flow took place in a pre-existing valley, we
ought to find under the rocky covering beds of gravel, rolled
stones, and other _débris_ peculiar to a river bed. Such, in
fact, we do find extended along directly underneath the lava,
about fifteen hundred feet above the general level of the
country. These old river gravels are found to be very rich in
gold, and miners have tunneled into them in numerous places in
search of the valuable metal. In order to determine the
geological age of these gravels, and subsequent lava flow, a
careful examination of portions of plants and bones of animals
found therein has been made. The plants are pronounced by
competent authority6 to be Pliocene, totally distinct from any
specimens now growing in California. The animal remains are
rhinoceroses, camels, and an extinct species of horse. The age of
these gravels is, therefore, pronounced to be Pliocene. We would
say in this connection that the auriferous gravels of California
have been the object of a very careful research by Prof. Whitney.
He adds to his conclusions that of another of the State
geologists. We need not give in detail his arguments, but he
reaches the conclusion that the auriferous gravels of the Pacific
slope represent the whole of the Tertiary Age.7
We have seen that in the ancient gravels of European rivers
archæologists have found the materials wherewith to build a
fascinating story of man’s appearance in Quaternary times. We
have underneath the lava flow of California the gravel beds of
rivers far antedating the gravels of the Somme. It is therefore
not a little interesting to learn from Prof. Whitney that he
finds many proofs of the existence of man in the gravels of the
Pliocene Age in California. Under the solid basalt of Table
Mountain have been found many works of men’s hands, as well as
the celebrated “Calaveras Skull.”
Calaveras Skull.
This skull was taken from a mining shaft at Altaville, at a depth
of one hundred and thirty feet from the surface, beneath seven
different strata of lava and gravel. Prof. Whitney was not
present when it was found. He, however, made it his business to
examine into the facts of the case, and he thus speaks of it:
“That the skull was found in these old, intact, cemented gravels
has been abundantly proved by evidence that can not be gainsaid.”
And again: “So far as human and geological testimony can at
present be relied on, there is no question but that the skull was
found under Table Mountain, and is of the Pliocene Age.”8
This would seem to be pretty explicit, but, as we have said
before, Prof. Whitney, in his formal report as the State
geologist of California, reaches the conclusion that the
auriferous gravels of the Pacific are all of the Tertiary Age. It
is therefore not a little interesting to learn that numerous
instances are recorded of the finding of human remains or the
works of man in these gravels. Prof. Whitney mentions twenty such
instances.9 Mr. Bancroft furnishes us a list of such discoveries,
giving as his authority Mr. C. D. Voy, of the California
Geological Survey, of Oakland, California. He states that Mr. Voy
personally visited most of the localities where the discoveries
were made, and took all possible pains to verify their
authenticity, and in many cases obtaining sworn statements from
the parties who made them.10
Two stone mortars and spear-heads, six and eight inches long,
were found in the gravel under Table Mountain, just mentioned.
These relics were found about three hundred feet from the
surface. A hundred feet and more of this depth was of solid lava.
At another place a stone bead was found three hundred feet from
the mouth of the tunnel, under a thick layer of lava. Many other
instances might be given of such discoveries, not always under
lava coverings, but always in such instances that we are
compelled to assign to them an immense antiquity. As, for
instance, at San Andreas, according to a sworn statement in Mr.
Voy’s possession, large stone mortars were taken from a layer of
cemented gravel, overlain by one hundred and twenty-five feet of
volcanic and gravel materials. Many similar instances are on
record, but enough have been mentioned to serve the purpose of
the chapter.11
As we have briefly gone over the ground on which the antiquity of
man in America is, by some, referred to the Pliocene Age, it is
but fair to notice some of the objections that have been raised.
It is not necessary to point out that the only questions worthy
to be considered are of a scientific nature.
We must deny either the age of the gravels themselves or that the
objects of human handiwork were found as claimed, or else that
they are of the same age as the gravels. Prof. LeConte thinks,
from the nature of the gravels and the peculiar circumstances
which surround them, that they are not older than the close of
the Pliocene Age. He thinks they, in fact, belong to the
transitory period between that age and the Quaternary.12 But as
we are considering the question of Pliocene man, it makes but
little difference if the gravels do belong to the very close of
that period. They may still be called Pliocene.
One great trouble with those remains is that they were not
discovered by professed geologists. We have to depend upon the
statements of miners. But if their statements can be believed
(and why should they not?), there is no doubt about their
genuineness. The testimony, as Mr. Whitney says, “all points in
one direction, and there has never been any attempt made to pass
off on any member of the survey any thing out of keeping, or—so
to speak—out of harmony with what has been already found, or
might be expected to be found. It has always been the same kind
of implements which have been exhibited to us, namely, the
coarsest and the least finished, which one would suppose could be
made, and still be implements at all.”13 This result would hardly
be possible, where so many parties are concerned in furnishing
the evidence, if the objects were not genuine.14
In opposition to this conclusion it has been urged that the stone
mortars, pestles, etc., have become imbedded in the gravel by the
action of streams, or slips from the mountain side in modern
times, or are the results of interments or mining operations.15
As an illustration of how they might become buried by the action
of streams, reference is made to somewhat similar discoveries in
the tin-bearing streams of Cornwall (Wales). We know with
considerable certainty that at a very early date the Phœnicians
worked in the gravels of these streams for tin ores. Implements
made use of by them and others—such, for instance, as shovels,
mortars, pick-axes, stone bowls, and various dishes—have been
found at all depths in this gravel, by more modern miners.16
This may explain the presence, in some instances, of similar
remains in California, but it utterly fails to do so, where the
remains have been buried underneath a lava flow or a bed of
volcanic materials, as is the case in many of the instances we
have cited. Manifestly no water has disturbed their strata since
the volcanic materials were laid down. Neither can we think of a
land-slide carrying these remains into the heart of a mountain,
or burying them underneath a hundred feet of lava. The peculiar
position in which they were often found is surely lost sight of
by those who think they might have been placed there by
interment. We can not think of a savage people digging a grave in
such a position.
It has been urged with considerable force that these relics have
been left behind by ancient miners when they mined for gold. Dr.
Wilson is cited as authority for the statement that the Mexicans
obtained “silver, lead, and tin from the mines of Tasco and
copper was wrought in the mountains of Zacotollan by means of
galleries and shafts, opened with persevering toil where the
metallic veins were imbedded in the solid rock.” Prescott, the
historian, also testifies to the same fact.
We need only add to this, that wherever these ancient galleries
were opened in the solid rock, they still exist. Schoolcraft
mentions finding one two hundred and ten feet deep.17 The chances
are not worth considering, that these old mines would be
overlooked. If, for instance, the Calaveras skull is that of a
prehistoric miner, killed in an old mining gallery only a
thousand years or so ago, it is inconceivable that all evidence
of this mine should have disappeared. Or, if in one case it
should have done so, it would surely have been detected in other
instances. The variety and explicitness of the testimony brought
forward makes all such supposition improbable.18
It is best, in this matter, to hold the judgment in suspense. We
have stated Mr. Whitney’s position, and the objections that have
been raised to it. The amount of thought bestowed on the
antiquity of man will doubtless soon clear up the whole matter.
We can not do better than to consider his surroundings, supposing
that he was really present. The country must have been very
different from the California of to-day. Dr. Cooper says, “The
country consisted of peninsulas and islands, like those of the
present East Indies; resembling them also in climate and
productions.”19 The probabilities are that to the west and
southwest of California, instead of watery expanse of the
Pacific, only broken here and there by an ever-verdant islet,
there was either a continental expanse of land or, at any rate, a
vast archipelago. We know that over a large part of the Northern
Pacific area the land has sunk not less than six thousand feet
since late Tertiary times.20
We are certain the ocean area must have presented a vastly
different aspect before that depression commenced. It is not
unreasonable to suppose that communication between North America
and Asia was much easier than in subsequent epochs. It might have
been an easy matter for man to pass back and forth without losing
sight of land. It is therefore reasonable to suppose that if
Pliocene man was in existence, he would have occupied both sides
of the Pacific at this early time.21 These last conclusions are
very important ones to reach, and as there is reasonable
foundation for them, we must bear them in mind in the subsequent
pages.
It will be remembered that the races of men who inhabited Europe
in the Paleolithic Age had only very rudely formed, unpolished
implements. It is not until we arrive at the Neolithic stage of
culture that we meet with specimens of polished stone implements.
To judge from the specimens of early Californian art, the
beautifully polished pestles, beads, plummets or sinkers,
spear-heads, etc., Pliocene man in California must have been in
the Neolithic stage of culture. Though they were not acquainted
with the potter’s art, yet from their skill in working vessels of
stone, they had undoubtedly passed entirely through Savagism, and
had entered the confines of Barbarism,22 as far advanced, in
fact, as many of the Indian tribes the Spaniards found in
possession of the country.
It must be confessed this seems very singular. It is this
statement that causes many to shut their eyes to what would be
otherwise at once admitted and refuse to believe the genuineness
of the discovery. If the implements brought to light had been of
the rude River Drift type—celts but little removed from nodules
of flint—scholars would not be so cautious about accepting them.
But when we learn they are Neolithic, we at once see why they
hesitate, and ask for more conclusive proofs; yet this is no
reason to disregard the discoveries. They may be a great
surprise, they may be an unwelcome discovery to the holder of
some theories, yet the only question is, whether they are true or
not, and if true, theories must be modified to fit the facts.
Prof. Putnam thus speaks, in reference to them: “As the
archæologist has no right to be governed by any pre-conceived
theories, but must take the facts as he finds them, it is
impossible for him to do otherwise than accept the deductions of
so careful and eminent a geologist as Prof. Whitney, and draw his
conclusions accordingly, notwithstanding the fact that this
Pliocene man was, to judge by his works in stone and shell, as
far advanced as his descendants were at the time of the discovery
of California by the Spaniards.”23
Perhaps a partial explanation of this matter may be found when we
consider all the circumstances of the case. The origin of man is
generally assigned to some tropical country. Sir John Lubbock
thus speaks of it: “Our nearest relatives in the animal kingdom
are confined to hot, almost tropical climates; and it is in such
countries that we are, perhaps, most likely to find the earliest
traces of the human race.”24 This is also the opinion of other
eminent scholars. M. Quatrefages thinks that man probably
originated in Asia. He points out, however, that, during Tertiary
times, the climate was much milder, and man might have originated
in Northern Asia.25 Now, if it be true that a great mass of land
has disappeared beneath the waves of the Pacific, why may we not
suppose that, if this sunken land was not the original home of
man, it was at a very early time inhabited by him; that here he
passed through his experience in savagism?26 We know how suited
the islands of the Pacific are to the needs of a savage people;
and we must not lose sight of the probable ease with which they
could reach the coast of California—and also of what Dr. Cooper
has told us of the climate and geographical surroundings of
California at that early time. So it may not be unreasonable to
suppose that man reached California long ages before he wandered
into Europe, and so reached the Neolithic stage of culture much
earlier than he did in other parts of the world.27
It might be objected, that if a people in the Neolithic stage of
culture lived in California in the Pliocene Age, they ought to
have reached a very high stage of culture indeed when the
Spaniards invaded the country. This is what we would expect had
they been left to develop themselves. The great geographical
changes that took place near the close of the Pliocene would cut
off the primitive Californians from the Asiatics. Not only was
the land connection—if it indeed existed—now destroyed, but
causes were changing the climate. Ice and snow drove from the
north life of both animals and plants, and for an entire
geological period communications with Asia by way of the north
must have been very difficult, if not cut off altogether. Who can
tell what changes now came to the Asiatic branch of these people?
We are but too familiar with the fact that nations and races
sicken and die: many examples could be given. The natives of the
Sandwich Islands seem doomed to extinction. In a few centuries,
the Indians of America will live only in tradition and song.
Such may have been the fate of the early inhabitants of the
Pacific continent: certainly it would not be surprising, if the
immense climatic and geographical changes which then took place
would produce that result. Or it may be that but a scanty remnant
lived on, absorbed by more vigorous, though less highly
cultivated stocks of the same people, whose homes had been on the
main-land of Asia—and the remnant left along the Pacific coast
must have lived on under vastly different circumstance. The
interior of North America was largely a dreary expanse of ice and
snow down to the 39th parallel of latitude. It is quite true,
this great glacier did not reach the Pacific Slope; but it must
have exerted a powerful influence on the climate: and the
evidence points, that the Sierra Nevada were occupied by local
glaciers which reached down into the fertile expanse of the
plains.
This was certainly a far different climate, and a far different
country, than that which sustained a vegetation of a tropical
growth. It may well be that the people should, as a result of
their changed conditions, have deteriorated in culture; or, at
any rate, their progress toward civilization may have been
stopped, and many thousands of years may have passed with no
perceptible improvement. It may be objected, that man will
improve under any state of existence, give him time enough. This
is, doubtless, in the main true. But a race may early reach its
limit of culture; in which case, as a race, it will not improve:
we may do much with the individual, but nothing, or but very
little, for the race.
In these considerations which have been advanced we may find some
reason for the early appearance of Neolithic man, as well as the
fact that he advanced no farther in culture. But whether man
first arrived in California in Pliocene times or not, he
continued to inhabit the land to the present day. He would,
however, be exposed to assault after assault from invading
tribes. We do not wish to examine the question of the origin of
the native Americans. It is held, by the best authorities, that
at least a portion of them came from Asia, using the Kurile
Islands as a stepping stone. Reaching the main-land of America,
and passing down the coast, they would, sooner or later, reach
the Valley of the Columbia—which has been characterized as the
most extraordinary region on the face of the earth in the variety
and amount of subsistence it afforded to tribes destitute of a
knowledge of agriculture. At certain seasons of the year the
rivers are crowded with fish, and they are then caught with the
greatest ease. As a mixture of forest and prairie, the country is
an excellent one for game. A species of bread-root grew on the
prairies; and, in the Summer, there was a profusion of berries.
To these advantages must be added that of a mild and equable
climate.28
These combined advantages would make this valley one of the
centers of population, from whence would issue successive bands
of invading people. A portion of these, passing over into
California, would come in contact with the descendants of
Pliocene man. The result would be, that the primitive
inhabitants, unable to escape to the west, would come in contact
with wave after wave of invading tribes. This is not altogether
theory. All inquirers into the customs, arts, and languages of
the primitive Californians have been struck with the remarkable
commingling of the same. We are driven to the conclusion that
here has been the meeting ground of many distinct tribes and
nations. “From such a mixture, and over-population of the most
desirable portions of the country, would naturally result the
formation of the hundreds of petty tribes that existed in both
Upper and Lower California when first known to the Spaniards.”29
In view of these facts, it is not strange that no advance in
culture is noticeable; and the grounds just mentioned may go far
to explain why we catch sight, here and there, of bits of
customs, habits, and manners of life which strangely remind us of
widely distant people—though it will not explain the presence of
words of Malay or Chinese origin which are claimed to exist.30
What is known as the Eskimo trace is quite marked in the physical
characters and in the arts of the Californians.31 It is,
probably, the continuance of the type of the primitive American
race.
It would naturally be interesting to know whether any date can be
given for the Pliocene Age, and so give us some ideas as to the
antiquity of man, if he were really here during that epoch. This,
however, is one of the most difficult questions to answer, and in
the present state of our knowledge incapable of solution.
Approximations have, of course, been made, and, as might be
expected, vary greatly in results. When it was acknowledged on
all hands that on geological grounds the age of the earth was
certainly very great, many times the few thousand years hitherto
relied on, it is not strange that popular thought swung to the
other extreme, and hundreds of millions of years were thought
necessary to explain the series of changes which the geologists
unfolded. This demand for a greatly extended time was
strengthened when the law of the gradual evolution of life was
expounded by the modern school of naturalists, and as great a
lapse of time as five hundred millions of years was not deemed an
extravagant estimate. Sir William Thompson has, however,
demonstrated that the time that has elapsed since the crust of
the earth became solidified can not be far from one hundred
millions of years, and consequently we know the time since the
appearance of life must be greatly less than that number of
years.
Attempts have been made to estimate the length of time required
to form the sedimentary crust of the earth. The results are so
divergent on this point that it is best not to adopt any standard
at present. Our views on this matter are also dependent on the
time that has elapsed since the close of the Glacial Age, which,
as we have seen, is not yet a settled point. If it be true that
the islands of the Pacific commenced to sink during late Tertiary
times, then we have a measure of that time in the growth of
coral, which has required at least four hundred thousand years to
form reefs the thickness of some that are known to exist.32
But here, again, it seems we are not certain when this depression
commenced.33 In a previous chapter we have gone over the Glacial
Age, and have seen when, according to Mr. Croll’s theory, it
commenced. This was probably not far from the close of the
Pliocene Age. We might as well leave the matter here. There are
so many elements of uncertainty that it is doubtful if we will
ever be able to assign satisfactory dates to the epoch.34
In bringing to a conclusion this somewhat extended notice of
early man in California we have to admit that much of it is
speculative; still it is an endeavor to explain known facts. The
main statement is that man lived in California in the Pliocene
Age, in the Neolithic stage of culture. Whether the arguments
adduced in support of this statement are sufficient to prove its
accuracy must be left to the mature judgment of the scientific
world. There is no question but that the climate and geography,
the fauna and the flora, were then greatly different from those
of the present. Starting with these known facts, so strange and
fascinating, it need occasion no surprise, if the pen of the
enthusiastic explorer depict a scene wherein facts and fancy are
united.
In this case truth is certainly stranger than fiction, and when,
in imagination, we see the great Pacific archipelago emerge from
the waves, and, in place of the long swell of the ocean, we
picture the pleasing scenes of tropic lands, the strange floral
growth of a past geological age, the animal forms which have
since disappeared, with man already well advanced in culture:
when we recall all this, and picture forth the surprising changes
which then took place, the slowly subsiding land, the encroaching
waters, and the resultant watery waste, with here and there a
coral-girt island, the great volcanic uplift on the main-land,
the flaming rivers of molten lava, which come pouring forth,
followed by the night of cold, ice, and snow: when we consider
these, and the great lapse of time necessary for their
accomplishment, how powerless are mere words to set forth the
grandeur and the resistless sweep of nature’s laws, and to paint
the insignificance and trifling nature of man and his works!
The discoveries in California are not the only instances of the
relics of man and his works found under such circumstances that
they are relied on by some to prove the great age of man in
America. But on account of the rarity of these finds, and the
contradictory statements and opinions respecting them, the
scientific world has until lately regarded with some distrust the
assertion of a great antiquity for man on this continent; but a
review of the evidence on this point, and especially of Dr.
Abbott’s discoveries in New Jersey, must impress on all the
conclusion that tribes of men were living here at the close of
the Glacial Age, and probably long before that time.
It need occasion no surprise to learn that several of the
discoveries of former years, relied on in this connection, have
since been shown to be unreliable. They have not been able to
stand a careful examination at the hands of later scholars. They
were made when European savants were first communicating to the
world the results of the explorations of the river gravels and
caves of that country. The antiquity of man being amply proven
there, may afford some explanation why more discriminating care
was not employed. Of this nature were some of the discoveries in
the valley of the Mississippi; such, for instance, as the portion
of the human skeleton found mingled with the bones of extinct
animals a few miles below Natchez, and the deeply buried skeleton
at New Orleans, in both of which cases a simple explanation is at
hand without the necessity of supposing a great flight of years.
Some of these discoveries yet remain an unsettled point. Such is
the discovery of flint arrow-heads in connection with the bones
of a mastodon found in Missouri. Dr. Koch, who made the
discovery, draws from the facts of the case such a suggestive
picture that we will give his own words. After describing where
found, he says: “The greater portion of these bones had been more
or less burned by fire. The fire had extended but a few feet
beyond the space occupied by the animal before its destruction,
and there was more than sufficient evidence that the fire had not
been an accidental one, but, on the contrary, that it had been
kindled by human agency, and, according to all appearance, with
the design of killing the huge creature which had been found
mired in the mud, and in an entirely helpless condition. All the
bones which had not been burned by the fire had kept their
original position, standing upright and apparently quite
undisturbed in the clay, whereas those portions which had been
extended above the surface had been partially consumed by the
fire, and the surface of the clay was covered, as far as fire had
extended, by a layer of wood ashes, mingled with larger or
smaller pieces of charred wood and burnt bones, together with
bones belonging to the spine, ribs, and other parts of the body,
which had been more or less injured by the fire. It seemed that
the burning of the victim and the hurling of rocks at it had not
satisfied the destroyers, for I found also, among the ashes,
bones, and rocks, several arrow-heads, a stone spear-head, and
some stone axes.”
Such is Dr. Koch’s very interesting statement of this find. “It
was received by the scientific world,” says Foster, “with a sneer
of contempt,” and, it seems to us, for very insufficient reasons.
It is admitted that his knowledge of geology was not as accurate
as it should have been. He made some mistakes of this nature,
which have been clearly shown.35 Still, he is known to have been
a diligent collector, and we are told “no one who knew him will
question but that he was a competent observer.”36 It seems to us
useless to deny the truth of his statements. There is, however,
nothing to necessitate us believing in an immense age for these
remains. This is not to be considered a point against them, for
there is no reason for supposing that the mastodon may not have
lingered on to comparatively recent times, and that comparatively
recent men may not have intercepted and destroyed helpless
individuals. Indeed, we are told there are traditions still
extant among the Indians of these monsters.37
We have other facts showing that, in this country as in Europe,
man was certainly living not far from the time when the land was
covered with the ice of the Glacial Age, whatever may be true of
still earlier periods. We are told that, when the time came for
the final breaking up of the great glaciers, and while they still
lingered at the head waters of the Platte, the Missouri, and the
Yellowstone rivers, a mighty lake—or, rather, a succession of
lakes—occupied the greater portion of the Missouri Valley. The
rivers flowing into them were of great size,38 and heavily
freighted with sediment, which was deposited in the still waters
of the lakes, and thus was formed the rich loess deposits of
Nebraska.
From several places in this loess have been taken rude stone
arrows, buried at such depths and under such circumstances, that
we must conclude they were deposited there when the loess was
forming. But this requires us to carry them back to a time when
elephants and mastodons roamed over the land, for bones of these
huge creatures39 are quite frequently found. This arrow-point
—or, it may be, spear-head—was found twenty feet from the
surface; and almost directly above it, and distant only thirteen
inches, was a vertebra of an elephant. “It appears, then, that
some old races lived around the shores of this lake, and,
paddling over it, accidentally dropped their arrows, or let them
fly at a passing water-fowl;” and, from the near presence of the
elephant’s bone, it is shown that man here, as well as in Europe,
was the contemporary of the elephant, in at least a portion of
the Missouri Valley.40
Implement found in Loess.
Other examples are on record. In Greene County, Illinois, parties
digging a well found, at the depth of seventy-two feet, a stone
hatchet. Mr. McAdams carefully examined the well, to see if it
could have dropped from near the surface. He tells us the well
was dug through loess deposits; and from the top down was as
smooth, and almost as hard, as a cemented cistern.41 The loess
was, as in Nebraska, deposited in the still waters of the lake
which once occupied the Valley of the Illinois.42 And we need not
doubt but that it dates from the breaking up of the glacial ice.
The position of this hatchet, then, found at the very bottom of
the loess deposits, shows that, while yet the glaciers lingered
in the north, and the flooded rivers spread out in great lakes,
some tribes of stone-using folks hunted along the banks of the
lakes, whose bottoms were to form the rich prairies of the West.
Previous to this discovery, Mr. Foster had recorded the finding
in this same formation, distant but a few miles, a rude hatchet.
There was in this case a possibility that the stone could have
been shaped by natural means, and so he did not affirm this to be
a work of man; but he says, “had it been recovered from a plowed
field, I should have unhesitatingly said it was an Indian’s
hatchet.”43 We think it but another instance of relics found
under such circumstances, that it points to the presence of man
at the close of the Glacial Age.
No doubt many similar discoveries have been made, but the
specimens were regarded as the work of Indians; and though the
position in which they wore found may have excited some surprise,
they were not brought to the attention of the scholars. Nor is it
only in the prairie regions of the West where such discoveries
have been made. Col. C. C. Jones has recorded the finding of some
flint implements in the drift of the Chattahooche River, which we
think as conclusively proves the presence of man in a far away
time as do any of the discoveries in the river gravels of Europe.
It seems that gold exists in the sands of this river, and the
early settlers were quick to take advantage of it. They dug
canals in places to turn the river from its present channel—and
others, to reach some buried channel of former times. These
sections passed down to the hard slate rock, passing through the
surface, and the underlying drift, composed of sand, gravel, and
bowlders. “During one of these excavations, at a depth of nine
feet below the surface, commingled with the gravels and bowlders
of the drift, and just above the rocky substratum upon which the
deposit rested, were found three [Paleolithic] flint
implements.”44
He adds that, “in materials, manners of construction, and in
general appearance, so nearly do they resemble some of the rough,
so-called flint hatchets, belonging to the drift type, as
described by M. Boucher De Perthes, that they might very readily
be mistaken, the one for the other.” “They are as emphatically
drift implements, as any that have appeared in the diluvial
matrix of France.” On the surface soil, above the flints, are
found the ordinary relics of the Indians. The works of the Mound
Builders are also to be seen. Judging from their position, the
Paleolithics must be greatly older than any of the surface
remains. Many centuries must go by to account for the formation
of the vegetable soil above them.
Speculating on their age, Mr. Jones eloquently says, “If we are
ignorant of the time when the Chattahooche first sought a highway
to the Gulf; if we know not the age of the artificial tumuli
which still grace its banks; if we are uncertain when the red
Nomads who, in fear and wonder, carried the burdens of the
adventurous DeSoto, as he conducted his followers through
primeval forests, and, by the sides of their softly mingling
streams, first became dwellers here, how shall we answer the
question as to the age in which these rude drift implements were
fashioned and used by these primitive people?”45
The examples we have quoted, even though the case of California
be not considered, are all suggestive of a great antiquity for
man, taking us back in time to when the glaciers still “shone in
frigid splendor” over the northern part of the United States.
When European savants had established the science of Archæology,
and shown the existence of separate stages of culture, it was but
natural that those interested in the matter on this side of the
Atlantic should turn with renewed energy to investigate the
archæology of this country, to see if here, too, they could find
evidence of a Paleolithic Age. But the scholar in this country is
confronted with a peculiar difficulty. Owing to the very
multiplicity and variety of relics of prehistoric times, it is
difficult to properly classify and understand them. The field is
of great extent, the time of study has been short, and the
explorers few; so it is not strange that but few localities have
been thoroughly searched. But, until this is done, we can not
hope to reach definite conclusions.
The peculiar culture of the Indians, prevailing among them at the
time of the discovery, proved a hindrance, rather than a help, in
this matter. The Indians are certainly not Paleolithic, many of
their implements being finely wrought and polished; but their
arrow-heads, hatchets, and celts were sufficiently rude to spread
the conviction that all weapons and implements of stone should be
referred to them. This belief has done much to hinder real
progress. It is not to be wondered at that some difference of
opinion has prevailed, among our scholars, whether the different
stages of culture, discovered in Europe, have any existence here.
On one hand, it is denied that different stages can be detected.
Says Prof. Whitney: “It is evident that there has been no
unfolding of the intellectual faculties of the human race on this
continent similar to that which has taken place in Central
Europe. We can recognize no Paleolithic, Neolithic, Bronze, or
Iron Ages.”46 Others assure us, that if present, the ages stand
in reverse order. “The relics last used were by far the rudest,
and the historic races, which are the survivors of the
prehistoric, are the wildest of the two; the lower status
remaining, while the higher has passed away.”47 In still another
place we read: “The Neolithic and Bronze Ages preceded the
Paleolithic, at least in the Mississippi basin.”48
Notwithstanding these quotations, we think it will yet be shown
that in this country, as in Europe, there was a true Paleolithic
Age, and that there was no such inversion as is here spoken of.
In some places sedentary tribes may have been driven away and
their territory occupied by more war-like, but less highly
cultivated tribes. But take the whole Indian race, and they were
steadily advancing through the Neolithic stage of culture. They
were acquainted with copper, and were drawing near to the
discovery of bronze and metals, and, indeed, the discovery had
been made of bronze in the far south. But lying back of the true
Indian Age, long preceding it in time, to which probably belong
the relics mentioned in the preceding discoveries, is a true
Paleolithic Age.
We are indebted for the facts on which the above conclusion rests
more to the writings of Dr. C. C. Abbott, of Trenton, New Jersey,
than any other individual, and his results are based on an
extensive study of the relics themselves and the position in
which found. In a collection of stone implements of this country
arranged in a cabinet, we find rude and unpolished specimens, as
well as those of a finely wrought Neolithic type. Now the
Indians, when first discovered, frequently made use of very
rudely formed implements, and from a knowledge of this fact, it
came about that but little attention was paid to the position in
which the relics were discovered. They were all classified as
Indian relics. But the greatest and most valuable discoveries in
science have occurred as a result of the attention paid to little
things; in this case by carefully scrutinizing the position in
which they occurred.
Dr. Abbott commenced by gathering a very extensive collection,
carefully searching his section of country and gathering all
specimens of artificially shaped stones. These must have existed
there in considerable quantities, as, in three years’ time, he
collected over nine thousand specimens,49 carefully examining
them as they came from the soil.50 As a result of this extensive
and careful research he is able to present us some general
conclusions. The surface specimens, including in this
classification also those specimens turned up by the plow,51 are
characteristically Indian. The material is jasper and quartz, and
they are generally carefully made. They used other varieties of
stone as well. Like the Neolithic people of Europe, they sought
the best varieties of stone for their purpose. But his collection
also included rude Paleolithic forms, and he found by taking the
history of each specimen separately, that just in proportion as
the relics were rude in manufacture and primitive in type the
deeper were they buried in the soil.52 Writing in 1875, he says:
“We have never met a jasper (flint) arrow-head in or below an
undisturbed stratum of sand or gravel, and we have seldom met
with a rude implement of the general character of European drift
implements on the surface of the ground.”53
These are not theoretical opinions, but are deductions drawn from
a very extensive experience. From figured specimens of these
rudest formed implements, we see they are veritable Paleolithic
forms, resembling in a remarkable manner the rude implements of
the old world, whether collected in France or in India. We
learned that the Paleolithic people of Europe utilized the
easiest attainable stone for their implements. They contented
themselves with such pieces of flint as they could gather in
their immediate vicinity. The easiest attainable rock in the
valley of the Delaware is not flint, but argillite, and such is
the material of which the Paleolithic implements are formed. Thus
it is shown that the first appearance of a stone-using folk in
the valley of the Delaware was in the Paleolithic stage of their
culture. Judging from the depths of their buried implements, this
long preceded the Neolithic stage.
Spear-shaped Paleolithic Implement.
These conclusions have been sustained in a very marked manner by
late discoveries in the valley of the Delaware, to which we will
now refer. After reaching the conclusion that the relics of the
Stone Age in New Jersey clearly pointed to a Paleolithic
beginning, when argillite, the most easily attainable stone, was
utilized in the manufacture of weapons and implements, Dr. Abbott
made the further discovery that in the ancient gravels of the
Delaware River Paleolithic implements only were to be found. We
must remember that it was in the gravels of European rivers that
the first discoveries were made which have since resulted in so
wonderfully extending our knowledge of the past of man.
The city of Trenton, New Jersey, is built on a gravel terrace
whose surface is between forty and fifty feet above the flood
plain of the Delaware. We are told that this gravel is clearly a
river deposit, and must have been laid down by the Delaware at
some former time in its history. It is in this gravel deposit
that quite a large number of Paleolithic implements have been
found.
Paleolithic Implement, Argillite.
This cut is a representation of one of them, found under such
circumstances that there can be no question about its antiquity.
We are told it was taken from the face of the bluff fronting the
river. Owing to heavy rains, a large section off of the front of
the bluff became detached just the day before this specimen was
discovered. It was found in the fresh surface thus exposed,
twenty-one feet from the surface, almost at the bottom of the
gravel. Immediately above it, and in contact with it, was a
bowlder estimated to weigh over one hundred pounds. Immediately
above this last was a second and much larger bowlder. It is
manifest the implements could never have gotten in the place
found after the gravel had been deposited.54
This is only one of the many examples that could be given. But it
is to be noticed that implements of the Neolithic type do not
occur in the gravel, except on the surface. Dr. Abbott is not the
only one who has found those implements. Many of our best
American scholars have visited the locality and secured
specimens, amongst others, Prof. Boyd Dawkins, of England, who is
so familiar with this class of relics in Europe. We may consider
it proven, then, that in this country there was also a
Paleolithic Age. Our present information in regard to it is only
a beginning.
Since this interesting discovery was made in New Jersey we have
received news of similar discoveries in Minnesota. A lady, Miss
Frank Babbitt, has found in the modified drift of the Mississippi
River, at Little Falls, Minnesota, evidence of the existence of
Paleolithic man. The implements are made of quartz, and not
argillite, but closely resemble implements made of this later
material as described by Dr. Abbott. It is, to say the least, an
interesting coincidence that one of a very few flint implements
found in the Trenton gravel by Dr. Abbott should be identical in
shape with some of the flint implements in Minnesota.55
This point being determined, others at once spring up asking
solution. Among the very first is the question of age. The river
terrace on which Trenton is built is a geological formation, and
if we can determine its age we shall also determine at least one
point in the antiquity of man, for we know the implements are as
old as the gravels. It is not necessary for our purpose to give
more than the results of the careful labors of others in this
direction. We may be sure that this question has been carefully
studied. When the implements were first discovered, the gravels
were considered of glacial origin, and to that period they were
assigned by Dr. Abbott. Subsequently Prof. Lewis, a member of the
Pennsylvania State survey, decided that they were essentially
post-glacial—that is, more recent in time than the Glacial Age.56
Still more recently Prof. Wright, of Oberlin, but also of the
State survey of Pennsylvania, concludes that they are, after all,
a deposit made at the very close of the Glacial Age.57
He thinks the sequence of events were about as follows: When the
ice of the Glacial Age reached its greatest development, and came
to a pause in its southward march, it extended in an unbroken
wall across the northern part of New Jersey, crossing the
Delaware about sixty-five miles above Trenton. In front of it was
accumulated the great terminal morain—a long range of gravelly
hills still marking its former presence.
It is certain that the close of the Glacial Age was comparatively
sudden, and marked by floods far exceeding any thing we are
acquainted with at the present day. For, when the formation of
the ice ceased, we must bear in mind that the country to the
north of the terminal morain was covered with a great glacier, in
some places exceeding a mile in thickness. When glacial
conditions were passing away, and the ice commenced to melt
faster than it was produced, the thaw would naturally go on over
the entire field at an increasing rate, and hence would result
floods in all the rivers.
He considers the gravels in question to have been deposited near
the close of this flooded period, when the land stood at about
its present level and the glaciers had retreated perhaps to the
Catskill Mountains. The rivers were still swollen and would be
heavily charged with coarse gravel brought from the morains and
lying exposed on the surface of the ground vacated by the
glaciers.58
Probably but few geologists will take exceptions to these views.
Thus we have very satisfactory reasons for connecting these
Paleolithic people with the close of the Glacial Age—a conclusion
to which the scattering discoveries mentioned in the preceding
pages also points. But as regards Dr. Abbott’s discoveries, they
are on such a scale, and vouched for by so many eminent
observers, that we need no longer hesitate to accept them, or
complain of the scattering nature of the finds.
But we might inquire whether this is the earliest period to which
the presence of man can be ascribed in this country? Excepting,
of course, California, we do not know of any well established
fact on which to base a greater antiquity for man. However, this
subject is very far from being as closely studied as in Europe.
Believing that in Europe man was living before the Glacial Age,
and that in all probability he was living in California at the
same early time, we would naturally expect to find some evidence
of his presence in the Mississippi Basin and along the Atlantic
seaboard. But no explorer has yet been fortunate enough to make
such discoveries.59
It is scarcely necessary to point out that we have only the
relative age of these gravel deposits. We have not yet arrived at
an answer in years. This we are not able to do. As we have
several times remarked, our American scholars, as a rule, do not
think many thousands of years have elapsed since the Glacial Age,
and yet they are not all agreed on that point. From the depths in
the gravel and loess deposits that the stone relics are found, we
may suppose that man was present during the entire series of
years their formation represents. Prof. Aughey, to whose
discoveries in loess deposits in Nebraska we have referred,
estimates the length of time necessary to produce those deposits
as between nineteen and twenty thousand years, and this he
considers a low estimate. So we see that, at any rate, the date
of man’s first appearance in America was certainly very far in
the past.
In forming a mental picture of the conditions of life at that
early time, it is not necessary to imagine a dreary scene of
Arctic sterility. This is not true of the time when the Glacial
Age was at its greatest severity. But at the time we are now
considering, the glaciers had retreated over a large part of the
country, though they still lingered in northern and mountainous
regions. Great lakes and majestic rivers were the features of the
country. The St. Lawrence was still choked with ice, and the
great lakes must have discharged their waters southward.60 The
Mississippi, gathering in one mighty stream the drainage of the
Central Basin, sped onward to the Gulf, doubtless many times
larger than its present representative. The animals then living
included several species that have since become extinct.
Mastodons and elephants must have been numerous, as their remains
are frequently found in loess deposits.61 They have also been
found in the gravels of New Jersey, in connection with the rude
implements already mentioned. Probably keeping close to the
retreating glaciers were such animals as the moose, reindeer, and
musk-ox, while the walrus disported itself in the waters off the
coast. At any rate those animals now only found in high northern
latitudes were living during Glacial times as far south as
Kentucky and New Jersey.62
A good deal of interest is connected with the finding of one
mastodon’s tooth. It was found in the gravel deposit, about
fourteen feet beneath the surface. It must have been washed to
the position where found when the great floods from the melting
glacier, with their burden of sand and gravel, were rolling down
the valley. We can either conclude that the climate was such as
to permit the existence of such animals, or that the animal to
which it belonged lived in some far away pre-glacial time. But
our interest suddenly increases when we learn that, but a few
feet away, under exactly similar circumstances, was found the
wisdom tooth of a human being. It, too, was rolled, scratched,
and polished, and had evidently been swept along by the
tumultuous flood. “The same agency that brought the one from the
Upper Valley of the Delaware brought the other, and, after long
years, they come again to light, and jointly testify that, in
that undetermined long ago, the creatures to which they
respectively belonged were living together in the valley of the
river.”63
We must now consider the question of race. Who were the men that
fashioned the implements? Were they Indians? or were they a
different people? As far as we know the Indians, they were
Neolithic. Their implements and weapons are often polished,
pecked, and finely wrought; and, as before remarked, they
employed the best kind of stone for their purpose. Dr. Abbott,
who speaks from a very extensive personal experience, tells us,
that it is not practical to trace any connection between the
well-known Indian forms and the Paleolithic implements of the
river gravels: “The wide gap that exists between a full series of
each of the two forms is readily recognized when the two are
brought together.”64 Besides this difference in form, there is
also a difference in material. The ruder forms not being of
jasper and allied minerals, but are almost exclusively of
argillite.65 In addition to the foregoing, we must consider the
different positions they occupy—the former being found only on or
near the surface, the latter deeply buried within. These
different reasons all point to the same conclusion: that is, that
the Indians were preceded in this country by some other people,
who manufactured the Paleolithic specimens recently discovered.
In Europe, Prof. Dawkins, as we have seen, maintains that the
Cave-men were the predecessors of the Eskimos. This may serve us
as a point of departure in the inquiry as to who the pre-Indian
people were? It is manifest, however, that we must have some
ground on which to base this theory. The Eskimo seem to belong to
the Arctic region, as naturally as the white bear and the walrus.
At the early time we are considering in America, glaciers had not
retreated very far. So his climatic surroundings must have been
much the same as at present. But the Eskimo may not live where he
does now by choice: we may behold in him a people driven from a
fairer heritage, who found the ice-fields of the North more
endurable than the savage enemy who envied him his possession. It
seems very reasonable to suppose that the Eskimos long inhabited
this country before the arrival of the Indians, if it was not, in
fact, their original home.
Mention has been made of the Eskimo traits still to be observed
among the tribes of California. Prof. Putnam thinks that this
fact can best be explained on the supposition that these tribes
came in contact with primitive Eskimo people.66 Dr. Rink, from
investigation of the language and traditions of the different
Eskimo tribes, thinks they are of American origin, and must once
have lived much farther south.67 He says, “The Eskimos appear to
have been the last wave of an aboriginal American race, which has
spread over the continent from more genial regions— following
principally the rivers and water-courses, and continually
yielding to the pressure of the tribes behind them until they
have at last peopled the sea-coasts.”68 Mr. Dall, in his
explorations of the Aleutian Islands, comes to the same
conclusion as Dr. Rink. He says his own conclusions are, “that
the Eskimos were once inhabitants of the interior of North
America—have much the same distribution as the walrus, namely, as
far south as New Jersey.”69
All this tends to prove that the Paleolithic people of New Jersey
were ancestors of the Eskimos. This becomes highly probable when
we pursue the subject a little farther. Dr. Abbott has shown,
from the similarity of implements, position in which found, and
so forth, that the Paleolithic people continued to occupy the
country down to comparatively recent times, when Indian relics
took their place.70 This is such an important point that we must
give his reasons more in detail. Remember that Dr. Abbott speaks
from the experience gained by gathering over twenty thousand
specimens of stone implements, and paying especial attention to
the position in which they were found. The surface soil of that
section of New Jersey, where he made his explorations, was formed
by the slow decomposition of vegetable and forest growth. In this
layer he found great numbers of undoubted Indian implements. The
number, however, rapidly decreases the deeper we go in this
stratum. This would show that the Indians were late arrivals.
Below this surface soil is a stratum of sand, overlying the
gravelly beds below and passing into the surface soil just
mentioned. In this layer were found great numbers of implements
inferior to the Indian types found on the surface, but superior
to the Paleolithic specimens described. They are not only
inferior in finish to the Indian specimens, but are of different
material. They are always formed of argillite. It was further
noticed that the number of these rapidly decreased in the layer
of surface soil, and are but rarely found on the surface.
Now it might be said that these rude forms were fashioned by
Indians when in a rude state of culture, and, as they became more
advanced, they learned the superior qualities of flint, and so
dropped the use of argillite. But it so happens that we have
found several places where were veritable manufactories of Indian
implements. It is very significant that we never find one where
the workman used both flint and argillite. He always used flint
alone. Every thing seems to point to the fact, that the tribes
who fashioned the argillite implements were different from the
Indian tribes who made the flint implements. It is Dr. Abbott’s
conclusions that the former, the descendants of the Paleolithic
tribes, were the Eskimos, who, according to these views, must
have inhabited the eastern portion of the United States to
comparatively recent times.
In further support of these views, we think we have grounds for
asserting that we have veritable historical accounts of the
Eskimo people slowly retiring before the aggressions of their
Indian foes. It is no longer doubted but that Norsemen, as early
as the year 1000, made voyages of discovery along the coast of
North America, as far south as Rhode Island: they called the
country Vineland. It is true that the Icelandic accounts of these
expeditions contain some foolish and improbable statements; but
so do the writings of Cotton Mather, made many years later.
These accounts refer but very briefly to the inhabitants they
saw, but enough is given to show that the people were not
Indians, but Eskimos. The language used is: “The men were small
of stature and fierce, having a bushy head of hair, and very
great eyes, and wide cheeks.”71 Their small size is frequently
referred to, which would surely not be the case if they were
describing the Algonkins that the English colonists found in the
same section of country many years later. To the same effect is
the assertion that the Eskimos did not reach Greenland until the
middle of the fourteenth century.72 The traditions of the
Tuscarawas Indians that place their arrival on the Atlantic coast
in the year 1300, also refer to a tribe of people that were at
least much like the Eskimos.73
Thus we are led, step by step, to the recognition of a
Paleolithic Age in America, and finally to the belief that the
descendants of these people were Eskimos. We at once notice the
coincidence of these results with some of the conclusions of
Prof. Dawkins, of England, and it is desirable to trace a little
farther the points of resemblance and difference between this age
in America and in Europe. In this latter country we have seen the
Paleolithic Age can be divided into two stages, or epochs, during
which different races inhabited the country. The first, or the
epoch of the men of the River Drift, long preceded the epoch of
the Cave-men. It was those latter tribes only that Mr. Dawkins
connects with the Eskimos.
We have not yet found evidence in this country that points to
such a division of the Paleolithic Age. We have no relics of
Cave-men as distinguished from the men of the River Drift. It is
true, we are not lacking evidence of the use of caves by various
tribes,74 but there is nothing to show that such use was very
ancient, or that the people were properly Paleolithic. We can not
say what future discoveries will unfold, but as yet we have only
implements of the River Drift type, and these are the men Dr.
Abbott considers to be the ancestors of the Eskimos. In this
country, then, we have shown the existence of but one race of men
in the same stage of culture as the men of the River Drift, but
of the same race as the men of the Cave. These results may be
cited as an argument in favor of those scholars who think that
the men of the River Drift and the men of the Cave were in
reality the same people.75
In Europe there was apparently a long lapse of time between the
disappearance of the Paleolithic tribes and the arrival of the
Neolithic people, but we have no evidence of such a period in
America. The Paleolithic people remained in possession until
driven away by the Neolithic ones. All evidence of Paleolithic
man in Europe terminated with the Glacial Age, and there is
little doubt but what they date from preglacial times. Our
present knowledge does not carry us any farther back in this
country than the close of Glacial times. If we consider that the
Glacial Age in America coincides in time with the same age in
Europe, then the last statements would imply that the Paleolithic
Age here was later than in Europe; in fact, that Paleolithic man
had run his course in Europe before he appeared in America, and
some might even go further, and say that he migrated from Europe
to America. There are, however, no good grounds for such
conclusions. We believe that future discoveries will show that in
America also Paleolithic man was living in Glacial and preglacial
times.76
We feel that we have done but scant justice to this subject, but
we assure our readers that this question has been but little
studied in this country. Referring all relics of stone to the
Indians, our scholars have been slow to recognize traces of an
earlier race in America. Our sources of information are as yet
but few, and much remains to be done in this field. In Europe as
in America, scholars are still hard at work on the Paleolithic
Age, and we are to hold ourselves in readiness to modify our
opinions, or to reject them entirely and adopt new ones as our
knowledge increases.
There is one thought that occurs to us. From the combined
investigations of both European and American scholars, the Eskimo
is seen to be one of the oldest (if not the oldest) races of men
now living. They afford a striking illustration of the fact that
a race may early reach a limit of culture beyond which, as a
race, they can not pass. Should the American discoveries
establish the fact that the River Drift tribes are also Eskimos,
then we are fairly entitled to consider them the remnant of a
people who once held possession of all the globe, but who have
been driven to the inhospitable regions of the North by the
pressure of later people. What changes have come over the earth
since that early time? In the long lapse of years that have gone
by newer races, advancing by slow degrees, have at last achieved
civilization. The fiat of Omnipotent power could have created the
world in a perfected form for the use of man, but instead of so
doing, Infinite Wisdom allowed slow-acting causes, working
through infinite years, to develop the globe from a nebulous
mass. Man could, indeed, have been created a civilized being, but
instead of this, his starting-point was certainly very low. He
was granted capacities in virtue of which he has risen. We are
not to say what the end shall be, but we think it yet far off.
Stone Implement.
REFERENCES
The manuscript of this chapter was submitted to Dr. C. C.
Abbott, of Trenton, New Jersey, for criticism.
Dana’s “Manual of Geology,” p. 735, _et seq._
Ibid., p. 753.
Whitney’s “Geology of California,” Vol. I.
Whitney’s “Geological Survey of California,” Vol. I.
Dr. Newbury’s “Geological Survey of California.”
Whitney’s “Auriferous Gravels of California,” p. 283.
Cambridge Lecture, 1878.
Cambridge Lecture, 1878.
“Native Races,” Vol. IV, p. 698.
In general, all about Sonora, in the auriferous gravels, are
found bones of extinct animals, and, associated with them, many
relics of the works of human hands. These are found at various
depths down to one hundred feet. (Whitney’s “Auriferous
Gravels,” p. 263.)
_American Journal of Science,_ Vol. XIX, p. 176, 1880.
“Auriferous Gravels,” p. 279.
Wright’s “Studies in Science and Religion,” p. 289.
Dawkins, in Southall’s “Pliocene Man,” p. 18.
Southall’s “Pliocene Man,” p. 19.
Schoolcraft’s “Archæology,” Vol. I, p. 105.
As bearing on the question of Pliocene man, we might refer to
the impression of human (?) foot-prints in the sand-stone
quarry of the State prison at Nevada. At one time this area was
the bottom of a lake, and we can plainly see the tracks of
various animals that came down to drink. A huge mammoth visited
the place; so also did horses and other animals. Among these is
one series of tracks evidently made by a biped. Some think they
are the sandaled foot of a human being. This question is still
under discussion.
“Geographical Survey West of the 100th Meridian,” Vol. VII, p.
11.
Dana’s “Manual of Geology,” p. 583.
Putnam, in “Geographical Survey West of the 100th Meridian,”
Vol. VII, p. 11.
Ibid., p. 18.
“Geographical Survey West of the 100th Meridian,” Vol. VII, p.
12.
“Prehistoric Times,” p. 436.
“Human Species,” p. 147.