8. Why should the discovery of fire be regarded as of more significance than the discovery of steam? 9. Why has the invention of the bow-and-arrow been of greater importance than the invention of gunpowder? 10. How does the presence of few tameable animals in the New World help to account for its tardier development as compared with the Old World? 11. What examples of pastoral and agricultural life among the North American Indians are familiar to you? 12. Give examples of peoples widely different in blood who nevertheless speak the same language. 13. In the classification of mankind, where do the Arabs belong? the Persians? the Germans? the inhabitants of the United States? 14. Enumerate the most important contributions to civilization made in prehistoric times. FOOTNOTES [1] There are still some savage peoples, for instance, the Australians, who continue to make stone implements very similar to those of prehistoric men. Other primitive peoples, such as the natives of the Pacific islands, passed directly from the use of stone to that of iron, after this part of the world was opened up to European trade in the nineteenth century. [2] Iron was unknown to the inhabitants of North America and South America before the coming of the Europeans. The natives used many stone implements, besides those of copper and bronze. The Indians got most of their copper from the mines in the Lake Superior region, whence it was carried far and wide. [3] See the illustration, page 45. [4] See the illustration, page 14. [5] In the New World, the only important domestic animal was the llama of the Andes. The natives used it as a beast of burden, ate its flesh, and clothed themselves with its wool. [6] The plants domesticated in the New World were not numerous. The most important were the potato of Peru and Ecuador, Indian corn or maize, tobacco, the tomato, and manioc. From the roots of the latter, the starch called tapioca is derived. [7] See page 2. [8] See the illustration, page 14. [9] Latin cuneus, "a wedge". [10] See page 71. [11] From the Greek words hieros, "holy," and glyphein, "to carve" The Egyptians regarded their signs as sacred. [12] Our word "alphabet" comes from the names of the first two letters of the Greek alphabet, _alpha_ (a) and _beta_ (b). [13] See page 186 and note 2. [14] The Old Testament (_Genesis_, x 21-22) represents Shem (or Sem), son of Noah, as the ancestor of the Semitic peoples. The title "Indo- Europeans" tells us that the members of that group now dwell in India and in Europe. Indo-European peoples are popularly called "Aryans," from a word in Sanskrit (the old Hindu language) meaning "noble." CHAPTER II THE LANDS AND PEOPLES OF THE EAST TO ABOUT 600 B.C. [1] 7. PHYSICAL ASIA GRAND DIVISIONS OF ASIA