NEOLITHIC PERIOD.
Transition from the Paloolithic to the Neolithic Period.—As in Europe, so in North America, the transition from the Paleolithic to the Neolithic Period seems to have been abrupt. At least the relics of the two are sharply defined. This is well illustrated, as we have already said (p. 61), by the Trenton deposits. Material, form, and workmanship alike differ.
How are we to explain this? Did the pakeolithic man finally succumb to the austere climate which prevailed? or did he migrate to distant regions and the neolithic man move peacefully into his deserted fields? Or was there a merciless conflict between the two, in which the older race utterly perished? Or is the solution simply that we have lost several links in the development of the same people, and that the contrast is merely one of time? These are interesting questions, to which, as yet, no satisfactory answer has been offered, and we are obliged to leave them to future investigation.
Certain it is that, passing from the second epoch of pakeolithic life, represented by the Trenton sands and the loess of the Nebraska lakes, we at once arrive at a period of culture where the grinding, boring, and pol ishing of stones were practised, where the art of the potter had been discovered, where some knowledge of agriculture was general, and where the dead were honored with formal sepulture.
Although the Stone Age prevailed over the whole continent, not a single tribe was found whose arts were of the pakeolithic type—not one that continued exclusively the technical methods of the men of the Trenton gravels.
21•eas Culitern—The Northern and Southern continents may be subdivided into large areas, over each of which many similarities of culture prevailed. Thus, the space now embraced in the United States and the southern portion of British America was held by tribes less advanced than most of those of Mexico and Central America. They have been called "hunting tribes," but this conveys an erroneous idea, as most of them practised agriculture, often to a considerable extent.
There are numerous indications that all the partly civilized tribes of Mexico and Central America (see Vol. I. p. rS3) had derived many elements
of their culture from a common source, although these tribes themselves differed radically in languages.
Another centre of civilization, having apparently nothing in common with that just mentioned, extended its influence in the valleys and along the western slope of the Andes almost from the Isthmus of Panama south to the Desert of Atacama.
The remainder of the Southern continent, including the Wrest Indian Archipelago, which both ethnologically and by the facts of physical geo graphy belongs to South America, was, when first explored, inhabited by tribes in no wise superior to those of the area of the United States, and generally rather lower in culture.
The examination of the Archeology of these several areas will now engage our attention, omitting, however, from consideration their archi tectural remains, which have in part been discussed in the previous volume, and will also be spoken of in a subsequent portion devoted to that art. (See Vol. I. p. 102, 41-43; also Vol. IV., I. 19.) ARCHiEOLOGY OF THE AREA OF THE UNITED STATES.
As already stated, we shall include in this division the southern por tions of British America. At the Discovery the valleys of the St. Law rence and the Saskatchewan, the shores of Hudson Bay and those of the Pacific slope, were peopled by tribes who had numerous relatives within the boundaries of what are now the United States.
Subdivisions.—This vast region is usually divided for archeological study into several sub-areas, characterized by closer similarities among their relics. Thus there are— I. The Atlantic Coast area, including the lower St. Lawrence Valley; 2. The area of the Gulf States, from the Rio Grande east to the coast of Georgia and Florida; 3. The area of the Mississippi Valley, extending from the Great Lakes to the Tennessee River; 4. The Plains, along the eastern slope of the Rocky Mountains; 5. The area of the Pueblos in Arizona, New Mexico, and the adjacent territory; and, finally, 6. The Pacific Slope, embracing British Columbia, Washington Terri tory, Oregon, and California.