Some authorities think that iron, in Egypt at least, came in about the same time as bronze, or even earlier. Certain peoples missed altogether one or another of these stages, as the absence of remains indicates. For instance, the central Africans had, as far as is known, no bronze age, but passed directly from the use of stone to that of iron. (See Rice Holmes, _Ancient Britain_, p. 123.) See the notes to p. 129 on the value of iron. Occasional implements of any material better than that ordinarily in use, which had been introduced by trade or acquired by fighting, were very highly prized. Any books on primitive peoples contain references to the value of such “foreign tools.” 126 : 24. Diodorus Siculus, V. Consult _Crania Britannica_, by Davis and Thurnam, the chapter on the “Historical Ethnology of Britain,” for evidence that the Phœnicians did have intercourse with Britain. For a full discussion of this disputed question see pp. 483–514 in Rice Holmes’s _Ancient Britain_. Herodotus and other early writers allude to the fleets of the Phœnicians, and of course the voyage of Pythias about the last half of the fourth century B. C. was undertaken to discover the source of the Phœnician tin. See Holmes’s _Britain_, pp. 217–226; D’Arbois de Jubainville, _Les premiers habitants de l’Europe_, vol. I, chap. V; Hall, _Ancient History of the Near East_, pp. 158, 402–403; and G. Elliot Smith, _Ancient Mariners_, on the Phœnicians. On pp. 251–252 of _Ancient Britain_, Rice Holmes makes the suggestion that the export of tin from Britain may have died down by Roman times. 127 : 9 _seq._ G. Elliot Smith, 1, p. 178, and map 3. Deniker, 2, p. 315, says: “It is generally admitted that the ancient Bronze Age corresponds with the ‘Ægean Civilization’ which flourished among the peoples inhabiting, between the thirtieth and twentieth centuries B. C., Switzerland, the north of Italy, the basin of the Danube, the Balkan peninsula, a part of Anatolia, and lastly, Cyprus. It gave rise, between 1700 and 1100 B. C., to the ‘Mycenæan Civilization,’ of which the favorite ornamental design is the spiral.” Myers, in _Ancient History_, pp. 134–135, states that in Crete the metal development began as early, at least, as 3000 B. C., and was at its height in the island about 1600 or 1500 B. C. Articles of Cretan handiwork found in Egypt point to intercourse with that country as early as the sixth dynasty, which he makes about 2500 B. C. See also G. Elliot Smith, 1, pp. 147, 179–180, and the authorities quoted on bronze. 127 : 26–128 : 1 _seq._ G. Elliot Smith, 1, pp. 178–180. Rice Holmes, 1, p. 123, gives in a footnote the sixth dynasty as about 3200 B. C. (_cf._ above), when Elliot Smith says the movement first began (_ibid._, pp. 169, 171). They do not agree on the date of this dynasty. See also Rice Holmes (_ibid._, p. 125), and Breasted, 3, p. 108. Montelius assigns 2100 B. C. for the small copper daggers of northern Italy.