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Our Neighbours in the Neolithic Period Presidential Address

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 October 2013

Reginald A. Smith
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Extract

It may seem a paradox, but it is nevertheless true, that more is known of the remote Palæolithic period than of the later Stone Age that ended about 4000 years ago. This applies to the Continent as well as to Britain, but Scandinavia is exceptional, and for our present purpose the best subject of investigation. The accepted view is that the three Baltic kingdoms were uninhabited in Quaternary times, and could only be approached by man after the last, or Baltic, glaciation had come to an end. There are certain facts inexplicable on that hypothesis, but all will agree that the Neolithic period in that area can be divided into early and late divisions; and so rich are the prehistoric remains and so advanced is this study, that the Scandinavian system can be used as a touch-stone by which to test the facts and theories of our own later Stone Age. I propose, therefore, on the present occasion to deal in some detail with the latest results of Scandinavian research, and then to proceed in order with the districts that face us across the North Sea and the Channel—North-west Germany, Holland, Belgium, and Northern France. It is hoped that such a survey will enable a more rigid classification to be made of the large amount of British material referred to the Neolithic period. In this country one has to rely mainly on form, but in Scandinavia that element is combined with others, such as habitation-sites, shell-mounds, and megalithic remains that furnish proof of the succession of forms, and open up the question of relations with Britain at that early date. If the claims already made on that head be valid, then comparisons become possible, and certain stages at least of the period in question can be arranged on scientific lines.

Type
Original Papers
Information
Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society of East Anglia , Volume 2 , Issue 4 , 1918 , pp. 479 - 507
Copyright
Copyright © The Prehistoric Society 1918

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References

page 479 note * According to Prof. de Geer the ice began to disappear from the southern extremity of Sweden (Scania) about 13,000 years ago.

page 480 note § Brögger, A. W., Norges Vestlands Stenalder, 5 Google Scholar (with references).

page 490 note § This method was practised on greenstone, etc., throughout the later Stone Age in East Norway but more rarely in Westland (the district between Egersund and Aalesund). The process is described by Dr.Müller, Sophus (Mémoires de la Société Royale des Antiquaires du Nord, 1897, p. 150)Google Scholar.

page 490 note * Brögger, W. C. (Strandliniens Beliggenhed, p. 210)Google Scholar figures however, a specimen shewing transition from the Nöstvet celt with trapezoidal section to the blunt-butted type.

page 494 note * This is a popular term for the coastal region between Aalesund (near Molde) and Ekersund (Jaederen), hence approximately that part of Norway situated west of the meridian 6° east of Greenwich.

page 495 note † Arne, T. J., Fornvännen, 1909, p. 99 Google Scholar.

page 494 note § Frödin, O., Uber die Schwedisch-Danischen Verbindungen in der Steinzeit (Opuscula Oscari Montelio, p 45)Google Scholar.

page 499 note * Strandliniens Beliggenhed under Stenalderen i del sydöstlige Norge (Norges Geologiske Undersögelse, No. 41).

page 499 note § A short bibliography of the zoned beaker is given by Schumacher, in Alterthümer unserer heidnischen Vorzeit, Vol. V. p. 357 Google Scholar.

page 500 note * Schuchhardt traces a connection between the shape of such beakers and the gourd, in contrast to the basket-pattern design of much Megalithic pottery (Westeuropa als alter Kulturkreis, p. 735).

page 500 note § Wilke contends that they originally moved from the north, as far south as Lengyel, in Tolna, Hungary.

page 502 note § A restoration is illustrated by Holwerda, in Prähistorische Zeitschrift, (1909)Google Scholar, pl. XLIV.

page 507 note § See on the whole subject his treatise on the influence of Oriental culture on Europe to the 5th Century B.C., in Antiquarisk Tidskrift för Sverige, XIII. (1905)Google Scholar: Orienten och Europa (German edition, Der Orient und Europa, 1899).