The New Stone Age in Northern Europe Part 8

According to Montelius,[122] who is our best authority on chronology, the use of bronze in sufficient quant.i.ties to mark the beginning of a new period took place in different countries at the dates given in the second column of the following table, the first column showing the date of the first use of copper:[123]

+-------------------------------+-----------------+ REGION YEAR B. C. +-------------------------------+--------+--------+ COPPER BRONZE +--------+--------+ Egypt and Chaldaea 5000 3000 Troy, Greece, and Sicily 3000 2500 Hungary and Spain 3000 2000 Middle Europe and France 2500 2000 North Germany and Scandinavia 2500 1900 +-------------------------------+--------+--------+

These dates mark the beginning of the more or less general use of metals, not the first appearance of a few imported articles. Some authorities would place the beginning of the Bronze period a few centuries earlier, and that of the introduction of copper some 500 years earlier.[124] Forrer dates the beginning of both epochs a little later than Montelius. The date 2000 B. C. would seem to mark the end of the Neolithic period in middle Europe with approximate accuracy.

In attempting to determine the date of the beginning of the Neolithic period we may begin with a remote point of departure for comparison and select the Buhl stage and the beginning of the Magdalenian Epoch. Nuesch made a careful estimate from the deposits at Schweizersbild near Schaffhausen, Switzerland. His method of estimating is described fully by Obermaier.[125] He places the beginning of the Neolithic deposits here at 6000 B. C., and considers 20,000 years as a fair estimate for the time elapsed since the first occupation of this locality by Magdalenian hunters at some time during the Buhl Epoch. Obermaier, summing up the evidence, concludes that the beginning of the Magdalenian Epoch could not have been later than 16,000-18,000 B. C., and that it ended not far from 12,000 B. C. Osborn says: "Buhl moraines in Lake Lucerne are estimated as having been deposited between 16,000 and 24,000 years B. C."

He also appears to place the Maglemose culture at about 7000 B. C.[126]

We may now turn to the great Scandinavian ice-sheet, whose retreat may have begun somewhat later and proceeded more slowly on account of its more northerly position. Here De Geer has made a report based on a very careful study of the annual layers of deposition formed during the glacial retreat. We have already seen that the material brought down by the spring freshets differs in color and texture from that of late summer and autumn. Hence these annual layers are almost as distinct and as easily counted as the rings in the trunk of a tree. This method promises great accuracy of results, and the thickness and character of the layers and their included organic remains throw much light on the climatic and other conditions under which they were laid down. But even here the length of certain periods of halt in the glacial retreat can be only very roughly approximated. The number of annual layers of deposit in the Swedish Lake Ragunda lately drained shows the number of years since the lake was uncovered almost at the end of the retreat of the Scandinavian ice.

Says Sollas: "The Ancylus Lake was in existence at a time when the ice had very nearly, though not quite, accomplished its full retreat, _i.

e._, a little more than 7,000 years ago (the length of post-glacial time); and Baron de Geer, although he has not yet been able to bring the beach of the lake into connection with his system of measurements, thinks, as he has kindly informed me, that its probable date may be 7,500 years counting from the present."[127]

Menzel, in a chart embodying the results of his study of De Geer's work, places the beginning of the retreat of the ice in Germany at 21,000 B.

C., the maximum of the Littorina depression and epoch of kitchen-middens at 6000 B. C., full Neolithic at 4500 B. C., beginning of Bronze period 1700 B. C.[128]

Keilhack, basing his study on the silting and dune-formation at Swinepforte, estimates that the time elapsed since the maximum of the Littorina depression down to the present has been about 7,000 years, making the date of the depression about 5000 B. C. He considers his estimate as somewhat more probable than De Geer's.

Anderson has called attention to the change of position of the earth's axis at different times. When the position of the earth's axis was such as to give most sunlight in Sweden, the midnight sun was above the horizon at Karesuanda, the most northern astronomical station, 62 days.

During the time of most unfavorable position it was above the horizon only 38 days, a difference of 24 days. This change should influence climate and vegetation. The period of maximum sunshine, according to this view, was 9,000 years ago, about 7000 B. C., somewhat earlier than the maximum of the Littorina depression. It would tend to give a climatic optimum at nearly the same time as estimated by Menzel.

Steenstrup[129] discovered the succession of forest growths in the peat-bogs or moors of Zealand, north of Copenhagen. In the layers of some of the depressions he found what seemed to be almost a complete record of forest life from the time of the retreat of the glaciers. The upper layers of peat contained remains of trees still flourishing in the surrounding country: alders, birches, and beeches. Then came oaks, and still deeper the pines. Beneath these were aspens, arctic willows, and other plants of the far north. Remains of the reindeer occur in their lowest layer. The pines hardly, if at all, reached Denmark before the Ancylus Epoch, preceding periods showing only the Dryas flora.

The pines had a hard struggle for life at first. They are dwarfed and their rings of annual growth are very thin, sometimes as many as seventy to the inch of thickness. Still some of these dwarfs attain the very respectable age of 300 to 400 years. Gradually they prospered, and in the upper layers there are trunks more than a metre in diameter. All these facts point to early and long occupation. Steenstrup reckoned the age of the oldest layers of these acc.u.mulations at 10,000 to 12,000 years, dating their beginnings therefore at 8000 to 10,000 B. C. Pine was still growing in the neighborhood of the sh.e.l.l-heaps, or the capercailzie or pine partridge would probably not have occurred.

But in the sh.e.l.l-heaps we find only oak charcoal, not pine. This was at least beginning to retreat and give place to the oak. At Maglemose we find pine charcoal but oak pollen grains in layers apparently of the same age as the settlement. Placing the sh.e.l.l-heaps in the early part of the pine epoch would date them as early as 7000 B. C., or even earlier, according to this chronometer. Hence the older writers, who placed the sh.e.l.l-heaps in the pine epoch, dated them considerably farther back than we do now.

Steenstrup's study, a work of genius, is entirely compatible with and probably implies a considerably later date than we used to accept.

The following table shows the dates a.s.signed by different students to Maglemose and the sh.e.l.l-heaps:

+---------------+-------------------+------------------------+ B. C. B. C. Obermaier Maglemose, 10,000 Sh.e.l.l-heaps, 8000 Forrer Sh.e.l.l-heaps, 8000-6000 Sollas Maglemose, 7,500 Osborn Maglemose, 7,000 Menzel (Chart) Sh.e.l.l-heaps, 6000 Keilhack Sh.e.l.l-heaps, 5000 +---------------+-------------------+------------------------+

The sh.e.l.l-heaps and Maglemose hardly seem to differ in age as much as Obermaier thinks; De Geer's study was very careful and certainly demands respectful attention. The tendency toward later dates for these cultures seems to be strong and increasing. If we place Maglemose at 7000 to 7500 B. C., and the sh.e.l.l-heaps 6500 to 6000 we have probably made them as ancient as the facts can well allow. It is better to hold judgment still somewhat in suspense. Even if Obermaier should yet prove to be correct in his apparently extreme dates, it is still evident that the Neolithic period began late and was of short duration compared with the millennia in which Paleolithic time was reckoned.

Our records are scanty for the earlier portions of the more or less than 5,000 years which we have allowed for the Neolithic period.[130] We find the sh.e.l.l-heap culture spreading from Denmark into Sweden and Norway.

Following closely, or overlapping it, crossing Norway from the region of Christiania, we find the Nostvet and Arctic cultures, perhaps nearly related, perhaps distinct, but leading over to the genuine Neolithic Scandinavian culture. Here we find forms intermediate between the axe and "pick" of the sh.e.l.l-heap and the axes of later epochs.

We have already described the rude, somewhat triangular axe of the sh.e.l.l-heaps. The axe of Paleolithic time had had nearly the shape of an almond. We will compare the pointed end to the back, and the cutting edge to the edge of our axe or carpenter's hatchet. The earliest polished axes of Denmark still retained nearly the shape of a somewhat long and thin almond.[131] Their cross-section might be compared to an ellipse with pointed instead of rounded ends. This is the "_spitznackiges Beil_" of Muller and Montelius. It occurs all over Europe and still farther, while the two following forms have a continually more restricted distribution. It is not found in the village settlements or stone graves, and evidently characterizes a period between these and the sh.e.l.l-heaps.

The second form, the _dunn_--or _schmalnackiges Beil_--may be compared to a long and flattened almond with a small part at the pointed end removed and a narrow strip cut off from each side. The flatter surfaces nearly meet at the end opposite the cutting edge, leaving this end thin. The surfaces have become much more nearly flat, and the cross-section a rectangle with somewhat short ends and slightly curved sides. These belong to the period of the earliest stone graves or still earlier. They could be easily fastened in a wooden handle. This form is very common in Scandinavia.

The third form, the _breit_--or _d.i.c.k_--_nackiges Beil_, has almost exactly the shape of a thick chisel-blade with broad and thick back opposite the edge, and is rectangular in cross-section. It appears in the later megalithic tombs and the underground stone vaults or cists.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FORMS OF PREHISTORIC AXE

Hammer axes--Late Neolithic.

Thin-backed axe. Dunn-nackiges Beil--Early and Mid-Neolithic.

Palaeolithic hand-stones--"Coups-de-Poing."]

Late in the Neolithic period, usually after the introduction of copper, we find an axe--or "hammer-axe"--shorter and much thicker, somewhat in the shape of a very light stonemason's hammer, and with a hole for the handle. These axes sometimes had two cutting edges, sometimes one edged and the other blunt for hammering. Many of them were exceedingly beautiful in form, design, and finish. But this method of fastening the head to the handle greatly weakened the brittle stone. Many of them were probably merely articles of luxury or adornment. The hole was made by twirling a stick or bone, with plenty of sand, water, and patience.

We have thus in the axes and the megaliths a well-established sequence of forms, but no means of fixing dates except at the beginning and end of the whole period. Apparently there was a long time between the Scandinavian sh.e.l.l-heaps and the fully established Neolithic culture, of which we have practically no records.

Peculiar types of axes (except the mattock), and the megaliths do not occur in the province of the banded pottery, which itself will probably some day give us the clew to a system of chronology. The pottery of Thessaly, Thrace, and certain parts of the Balkan Peninsula is being gradually synchronized with that of Mycenaean and pre-Mycenaean Greece.

Important discoveries seem reasonably certain in a not distant future.

We can only wait for them with what patience we can a.s.sume.

Our real and definite knowledge of the age of the lake-dwellings is hardly better. Hoops tells us that they belong to the Beech period of the Swiss flora. But this period may be much older in Switzerland than in Scandinavia; how much older we do not know. The underground stone burial-cysts of Switzerland look late. The small number of the villages containing no trace of copper and the high grade of household arts and technique in even the oldest of them suggest the same conclusion. Here again it seems dangerous to even conjecture a date.

Montelius, whose opinion on these subjects is certainly of great value, says: "All things considered, I am convinced that the first stone graves were erected here in the north more than 3,000 years before Christ."[132] (It may be safe, therefore, to date them provisionally between 3000 and 4000 B. C.) "The epoch of the dolmens with covered entrance (_Gangraber_) begins about the middle of the third millennium B. C., and the epoch of the stone vaults or cysts (_Steinkisten_) corresponds to the centuries about 2000 B. C."

CHART I. POSTGLACIAL STAGES

RETREAT OF ICE AND CHANGES

+----------------+---------------------+-------------------+----------------+ PARALLELS IN SCANDINAVIA WESTERN AND ASIA AND DATE MIDDLE EUROPE ELSEWHERE[133] +----------------+---------------------+-------------------+----------------+ 1. Aachen Stage. 24,000 (to 40,000) B. C. Ice-retreats in Solutrean. Dry [134] northern and Cold. Germany. Steppe and Tundra Fauna. Swedish-Finnish 2. Buhl Stage. 16,000 (to Moraines. Early 24,000) B. C. Magdalenian. [135] Moist and cold. Tundra. Yoldia Period. Middle Magd. Dryas Flora. Steppe Loess formed. Susa founded. Glaciers in 3. Gschnitz Stage. Anau founded.[136] 10,000 B. C.? Mountains. Late Magdalenian. Neolithic [137] Settlements in Ancylus Crete. Dryas, Birch, Pine Maglemose. Littorina 4. Daun Stage. 6,000 B. C.? Depression. Optimum Azilian-Tard. (7,000) B. C.? Climate. Oak. Campignian. Sumerians in Sh.e.l.l-heaps. Babylonia. Full Neolithic. Full Neolithic. Predynastic 4,000 Beech. Egyptians. (-6,000) B. C.? Copper Period. Bronze Period. Bronze Period. XI-XIII Egyptian 1,900- Dynasties. 2,500 B. C. +----------------+---------------------+-------------------+----------------+

CHART II. CHANGES OF CLIMATE IN DENMARK[138]

1. Arctic climate. Temperature about 8 Cent. Younger Yoldia layers, Older Dryas period. Flora: _Dryas octopetala_, _Salix polaris_.

2. Subarctic climate. Temp. 8-12 Cent. Older Dryas. Flora as in 1.

3. Climate becomes moderate, continental. First maximum temp.

12-15 Cent. Birches, poplars, junipers.

4. Climate subarctic. Temp. 8-12 Cent. Birches.

5. Climate arctic. Temp. 8 Cent. _Salix polaris._

6. Climate subarctic. Temp. 8-12. Younger Dryas period.

7. Temperature moderates. Dry continental climate. _a._ Aspen Epoch; _b._ Pine period with oaks beginning to appear=Ancylus period.

8. Moderate insular climate. Temp. 15-17 Cent. Climatic optimum. Older Tapes layers, Maximum of Littorina depression.

Sh.e.l.l-heaps.

9. Temp. 15-17 Cent. Probably slightly cooler than 8. Oak Epoch. Beech begins to appear but is still rare. Younger Tapes (Dosinia) layers.

10. Moderate insular climate about 16.1 Cent. Beech Epoch.

Mya layers.

These climatic changes seem to argue for a comparatively recent date for the Littorina depression and the sh.e.l.l-heaps.