=2. The Late Stone Age.=--Of neolithic men in Palestine much more is known. This knowledge comes in part from the numerous cromlechs, menhirs, dolmens, and “gilgals” which are scattered over eastern Palestine. A cromlech is a heap of stones roughly resembling a pyramid;[72] a menhir is a group of unhewn stones so set in the earth as to stand upright like columns;[73] a dolmen consists of a large unhewn stone which rests on two others which separate it from the earth;[74] and a “gilgal” is a group of menhirs set in a circle.[73] These monuments are the remains of men of the stone age who dwelt here before the dawn of history. They were probably erected by some of those peoples whom the Hebrews called Rephaim[75] or “shades”--people who, having lived long before, were dead at the time of the Hebrew occupation. Similar monuments of the stone age have been found in Japan, India, Persia, the Caucasus, the Crimea, Bulgaria; also in Tripoli,[76] Tunis, Algeria, Morocco, Malta, southern Italy, Sardinia, Corsica, the Belearic Isles, Spain, Portugal, France, the British Isles, Scandinavia, and the German shores of the Baltic. Some scholars hold that all these monuments were made by one race of men, who migrated from country to country. As the monuments are not found at very great distances from the sea, the migrations are supposed to have followed the sea coasts.[77] Others scout the idea of a migration over such long distances at such an early epoch of the world’s history, and believe that the fashion of making such monuments was adopted from people to people by imitation. Be this as it may, these monuments seem to have been in Egypt and Palestine before the Semites and Hamites developed into the Egyptians, Amorites, and Hebrews, for they were adopted by them as the “pillars” which are so often denounced in the Old Testament, and in Egypt were gradually shaped and prolonged into the obelisks. [Illustration: MAP OF PALESTINE]