History of Human Society. Frank Wilson Blackmar
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Название: History of Human Society
Автор: Frank Wilson Blackmar
Издательство: Public Domain
Жанр: Зарубежная классика
isbn: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/30610
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The third method is that of (3) anatomy, which is a study of the comparative size and shape of the bones of man and other animals as a method of showing relative periods of existence. Also, just as the structure of the bones of a child, as compared with that of a man, would determine their relative ages, so the bones of the species that have been preserved through fossilization may show the relative ages of different types of animals. The study of the skeletons of animals, including those of man, has led to the science of anthropometry.
The fourth method is to study the procession of man by (4) cultures, or the industrial and ornamental implements that have been preserved in the river drift, rocks, and caves of the earth from the time that man used them until they were discovered. Just as we have to-day models of the improvement of the sewing-machine, the reaper, or the flying-machine, each one a little more perfect, so we shall find in the relics of prehistoric times this same gradual development – first a stone in its natural state used for cutting, then chipped to make it more perfect, and finally beautified in form and perfected by polishing.
Thus we shall find progress from the natural stone boulder used for throwing and hammering, the developed product made by chipping and polishing the natural boulder, making it more useful and more beautiful, and so for all the multitude of implements used in the hunt and in domestic affairs. Not only do we have here an illustration of continuous progress in invention and use, but also an adaptation of new material, for we pass from the use of stone to that of metals, probably in the prehistoric period, although the beginnings of the use of bronze and iron come mainly within the periods of historical records.
It is not possible here to follow the interesting history of the glacial movement, but a few words of explanation seem necessary. The Ice Age, or the glacial period, refers to a span of time ranging from 500,000 years ago, at the beginning of the first glaciation, to the close of the post-glacial period, about 25,000 years ago. During this period great ice caps, ranging in the valleys and spreading out on the plains over a broad area, proceeded from the north of Europe to the south, covering at the extreme stages nearly the entire surface of the continent. This great movement consists of four distinct forward movements and their return movements. There is evidence to show that before the south movement of the first great ice cap, a temperate climate extended very far toward the pole and gave opportunity for vegetation now extinct in that region.
But as the river of ice proceeded south, plants and animals retreated before it, some of them changing their nature to endure the excessive cold. Then came a climatic change which melted the ice and gradually drove the margin of the glacier farther north. Immediately under the influence of the warm winds the vegetation and animals followed slowly at a distance the movement of the glacier. Then followed a long inter-glacial period before the southerly movement of the returning ice cap. This in turn retreated to the north, and thus four separate times this great movement, one of the greatest geological phenomena of the earth, occurred, leaving an opportunity to study four different glacial periods with three warmer interglacial and one warm post-glacial.
This movement gave great opportunity for the study of geology, paleontology, and the archeology of man. That is, the story of the relationship of the earth to plant, animal, and man was revealed. The regularity of these movements and the amount of material evidence found furnish a great opportunity for measuring geological time movements and hence the life of plants and animals, including man.
The table on page 64 will contribute to the clearness of this brief statement about the glacial periods.
THE ICE AGE IN EUROPE11
Geological time-unit 25,000 years
Prehistoric Types of the Human Race. – The earliest record of human life yet discovered is the Pithecanthropus Erectus (Trinil), the apelike man who walked upright, found in Java by Du Bois, about the year 1892. Enough of the skeletal remains of human beings were found at this time to indicate a man of rather crude form and low brain capacity (about 885 c.c.), with possible powers of speech but with no probably developed language or no assumption of the acquaintance with the arts of life.12
The remains of this man associated with the remains of one other skeleton, probably a woman, and with the bones of extinct animals, were found in a geological stratum which indicates his age at about 500,000 years. Professor McGregor, after a careful anatomical study, has reproduced the head and bust of Pithecanthropus, which helps us to visualize this primitive species as of rather low cultural type. The low forehead, massive jaw, and receding chin give us a vision of an undeveloped species of the human race, in some respects not much above the anthropoid apes, yet in other characters distinctly human.
There follows a long interval of human development which is only conjectural until the discovery of the bones of the Heidelberg man, found at the south of the River Neckar. These are the first records of the human race found in southern Europe. The type of man is still apelike in some respects, but far in advance of the Pithecanthropus in structure and general appearance. The restoration by the Belgian artist Mascré under the direction of Professor A. Rotot, of Brussels, is indicative of larger brain capacity than the Trinil race. It had a massive jaw, distinctive nose, heavy arched brows, and still the receding chin. Not many cultural remains were found in strata of the second interglacial period along with the remains of extinct animals, such as the ancient elephant, Etruscan rhinoceros, primitive bison, primitive ox, Auvergne bear, and lion. A fauna and a flora as well as a geological structure were found which would indicate that this race existed at this place about 375,000 years ago. From these evidences very little may be determined of the Heidelberg man's cultural development, but much may be inferred. Undoubtedly, like the Pithecanthropus, he was a man without the tools of civilization, or at least had not developed far in this way.
About 150,000 years ago there appeared in Europe races of mankind that left more relics of their civilization.13 These were the Neanderthaloid races. There is no evidence of the connection of these races with the Java man or the Heidelberg man. Here, as elsewhere in the evolution of races and species, nature does not work in a straight line of descent, but by differentiation and variation.
In 1856 the first discovery of a specimen of the Neanderthal man was found at the entrance of a small ravine on the right bank of the River Dussel, in Rhenish Prussia. This was the first discovery of the Paleolithic man to cause serious reflection on the possibility of a prehistoric race in Europe. Its age is estimated at 50,000 years. This was followed by other discoveries of the Mid-Pleistocene period, until there were a number of discoveries of similar specimens of the Neanderthal race, varying in some respects from each other. The first had a brain capacity of 1230 c.c., while that of the average European is about 1500 c.c. Some of the specimens showed a skull capacity larger than the first specimen, but the average is lower than that of any living race, unless it be that of the Australians.
Later were discovered human remains of a somewhat higher type, known as the Aurignacian, of the Crô-Magnon race. These are probably ancestors of the living races of Europe existing 25,000 to 50,000 years ago. They represent the first races to which may be accorded definite relationship with the recent races.
Thus we have evidences of the great antiquity of man and a series of remains showing continual advancement over a period of nearly 500,000 years – the Pithecanthropus, Heidelberg, Piltdown, and Neanderthal, though expressing gradations of development in the order named, appear to be unrelated in their origin and descent, and are classed as separate species long since extinct. The Crô-Magnon people seem more directly related to modern man. Perhaps in the Neolithic Age they may have been the forebears of present races, either through direct or indirect lines.
The Unity of the Human Race. – Though there are evidences, as shown above, that there were many branches of the human СКАЧАТЬ
After Osborn. Read from bottom up.
See Chapter II.
Estimates of Neanderthal vary from 150,000 to 50,000 years ago.