The Prehistoric World; Or, Vanished RacesAllen, Emory Adams
History
The Prehistoric World; Or, Vanished Races
Allen, Emory Adams
Archaeology; Indians; Prehistoric peoples
The Paleolithic Age in Europe seems to have terminated with the
Glacial Age. But we are not to suppose it came to an end all over
the earth at that time. On the contrary, some tribes of men never
passed beyond that stage. When the light of civilization fell
upon them they were still in the culture of the old Stone Age. We
are to notice that in such cases the tribes thus discovered were
very low in the scale. The probable data for the Paleolithic Age
have formed the subject of this chapter. While claiming in
support of them the opinions of some eminent scholars, we freely
admit that it is not a settled question, but open to very grave
objections, especially the date of the close of the Glacial Age,
which seems to have been comparatively recent, at least in
America. We think, however, that these objections will yet be
harmonized with the general results. Neither is this claimed to
be an exhaustive presentation of the matter. It is an outline
only—the better to enable us to understand the mystery connected
with the data of Paleolithic man.
In these few chapters we have been dealing with people, manners,
arid times, of which the world fifty years ago was ignorant. Many
little discoveries, at first apparently disconnected, are
suddenly brought into new relation, and behold, ages ago, when
the great continents were but just completed, races of men, with
the stamp of humanity upon them, are seen filling the earth. With
them were many great animals long since passed away. The age of
animals was at an end. That of man had just begun.
The child requires the schooling of adversity and trial to make a
complete man of himself, and it is even so with races of men. Who
can doubt that struggling up from dense ignorance, contending
against adverse circumstances, compelled to wage war against
fierce animals, sustaining life in the midst of the low
temperature which had loaded the Northern Hemisphere with snow
and ice, had much to do in developing those qualities which
rendered civilization possible.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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