Mesolithic

MESOLITHIC The close of the palaeolithic period coincided with a sudden change in climate. The Arctic conditions which had obtained throughout its middle and later phases disappeared. the mean an nual temperature rose. forests appeared and most of the old quaternary fauna either became extinct or migrated to cooler regions farther north. The cause of this sudden and complete climatic change is unknown, but it may perhaps have been con nected with some such phenomenon as the final break through of the Strait of Dover and the resulting redistribution of ocean currents.

Magdalenian man with his wonderful culture and art disap peared, his place being taken by a number of different, more or less isolated. peoples who occupied most of Europe until the arrival of the true neolithic civilization. They have left us their industries which. though productive of many problems for the prehistorian, the most part unrelieved by artistic manifes tations. The various cultures had different origins and some at least had their roots in the older upper palaeolithic cultures. But none the less in view of the new conditions under which they per sisted, the interconnections between some of them and the fact that in general they certainly cannot be classed as palaeolithic, it has become advisable to create a new main stage in the archae ological record between the palaeolithic and neolithic periods. Several descriptive names—Transitional, Epipalaeolithic. Meso lithic—have been suggested for the new period; in many ways the last of these seems to be the most satisfactory.

The following different mesolithic cultures have so far been recognized in Europe : the Azilian, the Tardenoisean, the Asturian, the Maglemosean. the Kitchen Midden and the Campignian. This list of cultures does not indicate any chronological sequence: their relations to each other have not yet been completely determined.

The Azilian Culture.

This culture was first recognized at and named after a site above the village of Mas d'Azil Arie.ge. France) on the left bank of the Arise just as the river enters a famous natural tunnel through the hill. While digging there the well known prehistorian M. Piette observed the following stratig raphy Surface soil.

Neolithic and bronze age industries (with foundry). Loam with the new industry Sterile loam with reindeer bones.

Black loam with reindeer bones and Magdalenian indus tries similar to some already excavated on the right bank of the river.

Sterile gravels.

The intermediate position of the new industry between upper Palaeolithic and neolithic industries is here clearly seen. In place of the splendid Magdalenian bone and stone tools. the former often beautifully decorated. the Azilian industries comprise poorly made bone polishers. spatulae or chisels. rough hone awls and a onotonous series of flint tools. including scrapers, many of the small round type. The only new variety of tool that appears is a broad, flat harpoon with poorly formed barbs which differ from their Magdalenian forerunners in that instead of being prominently cut out and much projecting from the round stern they are now formed by notches cut in the sides of the flat piece of material. This is usually stag antler, reindeer antler, almost exclusively used by the Magdalenians. being now very rare. There is generally a central attachment hole (round or almond shaped) cut through the base of the implement.

Hardly any engraved objects of Azilian date are known. There is one example from Sordes consisting of a small stone covered with meaningless lines. However, many river pebbles have been found painted in red ochre with dots and lines or combinations of both. forming veritable patterns. For what purpose these so called "painted pebbles" were made is unknown. At one site a number were found. and every one had been carefully broken in two, a fact which might suggest that they had some definite ritual significance. They have been compared with Australian churingas: it has been suggested that they were toys. money, counting boards, etc. Dr. Obermaier considers that the painted patterns on the peb bles may represent highly conventionalized figures of human be ings. Similar conventionalizations of the human form appear in a rock-shelter art group in southern Spain belonging to the late neo lithic or copper age. But it is very uncertain whether any of this later conventionalized art can be referred to an .Azilian culture, and comparisons therefore are dangerous unless a cultural connection between the two manifestations of art can be determined. The so-called Azilian painted pebbles long ago discovered in the pre cincts of a late Celtic broth in Caithness (Scotland) are quite unlike true Azilian painted pebbles and have no connection with them.

T sing the flat harpoon as the "type fossil." Azi.iian industries have been recognized in north Spain as far west as Asturias: in the central districts of the French Pyrenees; in east France: in Switzerland just south of Basle: in Bavaria : in Belgium near Liege: in Great Britain at Victoria Cave near Settle (Yorks). near Kirkcudbright, at Oban. on Oronsay island and elsewhere.

Azilian man as well as his industries apparently developed from upper palaeolithic predecessors under stress of the new climatic conditions. Whereas the palaeolithic folk were almost invariably long-headed. an interesting .Azilian burial found at Ofnet in Bavaria shows among a considerable total a certain proportion of round-headed individuals : this may perhaps indicate that the Azil ians were a mixed race. The burial in question consists of two small pits or nests containing decapitated skulls arranged in con centric circles, all facing west there is much ochre present as well as a number of necklaces and other objects of decoration. At one place at least the bones of a dog have been found in an Azilian site.

The Tardenoisean Culture.—The industries belonging to this culture and named after the type station at Fire en Tardenois in the department of the Aisne. in France. consist mainly of pygmy tools comprising crescents or lunates. triangles. blunted backs and the like. There is also a small burin which is typical of the culture. The pygmies indicate that Tardenoisean man had discovered the advantage of a composite tool which has the haft made of one material and the working edges of another. Thus a wooden or bone haft which is light and tough could be used to mount the flint pygmy knife blades or saw teeth which are sharp though brittle. Apart from their small size—crescents less than half an inch in length are known—the characteristic feature that all pygmy industries have in common is that. unlike the implements of the older types. the secondary chipping which they show is generally intended to make an edge blunt in order that it shall not cut into its haft rather than to shape or toughen a working edge. The working edge itself is simply formed by the intersection of two flake surfaces.

Pygmy industries have a world-wide distribution. but it is unsafe to class them all as Tardenoisean in culture. The discovery of the advantages of a composite tool may have been made by many peoples at very different times. Nevertheless the distribution of the Tardenoisean culture is wider than that of the Azilian. It occurs all round the shores of the Mediterranean and penetrates northwards at each end of the alpine massif, being found in Eng land, France and Belgium on the one hand and in the Crimea and Poland on the other. It is clearly connected with the late Capsian industries of north Africa and was undoubtedly evolved from an upper palaeolithic, probably late Capsian, culture. At Valle in north Spain Tardenoisean and Azilian tools are found together in the same archaeological layer; the two cultures are therefore contemporary. In fact they are often grouped together as the Azilio-Tardenoisean culture. At the Grotte des Enfants, near Mentone, occur many feet of archaeological deposits which show an Aurignacian culture steadily developing, undisturbed by Solu trean and Magdalenian invasions. It is interesting to note that almost insensibly the Aurignacian tools diminish in size and change their form, until in the top layers the student is surprised to find himself in the presence of an Azilio-Tardenoisean industry.

A Tardenoisean burial under a tumulus in the vicinity of Vit toria, Spain, has been described by Obermaier. At Ofnet, in Ba varia, Tardenoisean as well as Azilian tools have been collected, and in England Tardenoisean industries are found, notably at Hastings and on the Pennine hills near Huddersfield.

The Asturian Culture.

The Asturian industries occur chiefly in the north Spanish province of Asturias, where they were first brought to light by the Count de la Vega del Sella. They have been recognized also near Biarritz, and as far east as Catalonia; perhaps, too, traces of the culture occur farther north in France. The industries are found in veritable kitchen midden refuse heaps which consist largely of sea shells that have been thrown into the caves, these having served seemingly as dustbins for the inhabi tants. From stratigraphical evidence the Asturian culture is post Azilian, for deposits containing Asturian industries are found resting on others containing typical Azilian tools.

Asturian implements are very crude, but there is one character istic tool, the pick, which is manufactured from a more or less oval river pebble by chipping one end of it so as to leave a rough point. There are also some poorly made bone tools. Among the enormous quantity of the remains of shell-fish that have been found is the species troches. This fact is important as it indicates that the mean annual temperature of the district must have been slightly higher than it is to-day.

The Maglemosean Culture.

This culture is essentially north European, and industries belonging to it have been found in dis tricts stretching from Poland to the Baltic ; they are especially common in the latter region. Isolated Maglemosean tools have been found as far west as eastern England, and south-westwards a site has been discovered in north-east France, near Bologne.

Of great interest is the correlation of the Maglemosean culture with the earth movements that have taken place in the Baltic area since Quaternary times. At the end of the great ice age the whole area lay at a lower level than it does to-day and to the north of the Baltic sea there was a wide open channel connecting it with the Arctic ocean. The whole was known as the Yoldia sea, and in time this period corresponded with the post-glacial Buhl oscilla tion. There followed an uplift of the land when the Baltic became a lake known, from a small shellfish then common, as the Ancylus lake. At this period the pines which preceded the growth of oak woods were predominant and it was now that the Maglemosean culture flourished.

Later a second depression of the land occurred, but this time it was not on a large enough scale to produce a connection with the Arctic ocean. However in place of the "Belts" a wide opening to the North sea existed, and the increased Ancylus lake is now known as the Littorina sea because of the common occurrence in it of the shells of Littorina litorea. We find the pines were now largely replaced by oaks and the Maglemosean culture by that of the Kitchen Middens. In Finland, however, Maglemosean industries are found associated with oak trees, which indicates that in this district they were of rather later date than in Denmark and were contemporary with the Kitchen Midden culture there. Finally a slight uplift occurred inaugurating conditions similar to those which prevail to-day, and at the same time the oaks gave way to the beech and the birch.

Since the Magdalenian culture in France probably coincided with the Buhl oscillation, the Maglemosean culture, which is post Buhl and therefore post-Magdalenian, is thus seen to be truly mesolithic. It was in all probability contemporary with the Azilio Tardenoisean culture farther south, but was earlier in time than the culture of the Kitchen Middens with which however it is linked by many ties and from which it cannot be sharply separated except in age. For this reason then, if for no other, the Kitchen Midden culture too must be classed as mesolithic.

Maglemosean industries were first recognized under the "great heath" near Mullerup on the west coast of Zealand. Since then many other sites have been discovered in Denmark. The indus tries consist of stone and antler tools. The former comprise scrapers—both end scrapers and core scrapers—awls and a few pygmies. The latter include pierced axes, or more frequently adzes, as well as a characteristic type of harpoon having a single row of barbs. There are also pierced antler sleeves in which stone implements were affixed to give a sharp working edge, while the sleeves themselves were hafted on to a stick; the directions of the holes through which the sticks must have passed relative to the direction of the flint working edges show that these tools were usually adzes and not axes.

The Kitchen Midden Culture.

The position of the Kitchen Midden culture relative to the Maglemosean culture and to the post-glacial earth movements in Scandinavia has been already given. As regards its distribution—it is found near the coasts of south Scandinavia and round the southern shores of the Baltic— it is in fact again an essentially Baltic culture. It remains to say a few words about the industries themselves and their occurrence. The Kitchen Middens form low mounds a yard or more in height and sometimes covering an area of as much as iooyds. by 5o yards. They occur close to the coast and are composed almost en tirely of the remains of shellfish thrown aside by man. In these rubbish heaps are often rough stone and bone implements, and sometimes primitive burials. The remains of the dog are found and also a primitive pottery, the pots having a pointed bottom and a rough decoration just below the rim. The characteristic tool is a sort of chisel formed from a piece of flint or split stone pebble by squaring the sides, removing a large flake at one end and so obtaining a sharp edge by the intersection of this flake surface with the flat under-surface of the material. This tool also occurs commonly in the next culture to be considered. The same kind of antler tools and sleeves that were common in the Maglemosean culture persist, but now in the case of the sleeves it is noticeable that axes were the tools generally required. Tools made by a grind ing or polishing technique are absent. There are indications that the climate must have been slightly warmer than it is to-day may we for this reason suggest a contemporaneity for the Kitchen Midden and Asturian cultures? The Arctic culture, perhaps connected with the Maglemosean culture, survived and developed undisturbed in the hinterlands where the Kitchen Midden folk do not seem to have penetrated. This culture is found in Scandinavia and Finland and may occur even farther eastwards ; to it belongs, in all probability, the well known rock engraving art group of western Norway and northern and central Sweden, as well as some characteristically decorated pottery.

The Campignian Culture.

The Campignian culture is sim ilar in many respects to that of the Kitchen Middens, but it is found in more southern areas distant from the coast-line. The type station is near Blangy-sur-Bresle (Seine Inferieure, France). Here are found a number of pit dwellings, oval in shape and vary ing in size, being sometimes as much as five yards in the longer diameter and several feet deep. Over these hollows there were doubtless roofs formed of rough beams with an infilling of twigs and mud. At Campigny several of these pit dwellings had been sunk in mammoth-bearing gravels of Quaternary age and the fol lowing section is vouched for by M. Capitan. At the bottom was found a hearth with cinders and charcoal. Above these cinders was a yellow sandy loam containing Campignian tools. On the top was a modern humus which yielded, in one instance, a few polished stone tools. The industries from the sandy loam included the typical Campignian axe already described in connection with the Kitchen Midden industries, rough awls, scrapers, etc., and a coarse kind of pottery. The distribution of the culture is restricted to the northern part of western Europe, more especially to the north of France and Belgium.

The folk belonging to these various mesolithic cultures must have been in a primitive stage of civilization and must have eked out a somewhat precarious existence in the various parts of Europe. Nothing suggesting artistic tendencies in them has been found with the exception of a few more or less geometrically dec orated objects of Maglemosean and Kitchen Midden age. Their story is very different from that of their immediate palaeolithic forbears ; yet it is these people, in all probability, who very largely formed the basal stock of the later neolithic peoples of western Europe, absorbing the new knowledge introduced with the neolithic civilization, influences of which they began to feel both from the east and from the south at the end of mesolithic times.