The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1890-02-08
PROGRESS oE INVENTION.
Why the Bronze Axe Can BE Called the
beginning of Civilization.

UT
Why the Bronze Axe Can BE Called the
Beginning of Civilization.
The earliest and simplest forms OF
bronze axe with which we are acquainted
are profoundly interesting, as casting
flood of light uponthe general process
of human evolution all the world over.
Every new human invention is always
at first directly modelled upon the other
similar products which have preceded
it. There is no really new thing under
the sun. For example, the earliest En-
glish railway carriages were built on the
model of the old stage-coach, only that
three stage-coaches, as it were, were
telescoped together, side by side-the
very first bore the significant motto,
Irtd juRctd IN UnO-and it was this pre-
conception of the English coach-builder
that has hampered US ever since with
our hateful compartments" instead OF
the commodious and comfortable open
American saloon carriages. So, too, the
earliest firearms were modelled on the
stock of the old cross bow, and the
earliest earthenware pots and pans
were shaped like the still more primitive
gourds and calabashes. 1t need not sur
prise us, therefore, to find that the
earliest metal axes of which we have
any knowledge were directly nodded on
the original shape of the stone toma-
hawk. Such copper Ratchet, cast in
mold formed by polished neolithic
stone celt, was found in an early Etrus-
can tomb, and is still preserved in the
museum at Berlin. See how natural
this process would be. For, in the first
place the primitive workman, knowing
already only one form of axe, the stone
tomahawk, would naturally reproduce it
in the new material, without thinking
what Improvements in shape and design
the malleability and feasibility of the met
al would render possible or easy. But,
more than that, the idea of coating the
polished stone axe with plastic clay, and
thereby making a mold for the molten
metal, would be SO very simple that even
the neolithic savage, already accustomed
to the manufacture of coarse pottery
upon natural shapes, could hardly fail to
think of it. AS matter of fact, he did
not think of it; for cells of bronze or cop
hatchets, have been found in Cyprus by
General di Cesnola, on the site of Troy
by DR.. Schliemann, and in many other
assorted localities by less distinguished
but equally trustworthy psychologists.
To the neothilic hunter, herdsman, and
villager this progress from the stone to
the metal axe probably seemed at first
mere substitution of an easier for more
difficult material. He little knew
whittier his discovery tended. 1t was
pure human laziness that urged the
change. How nice to save yourself all
that long trouble of chipping and polish
ing, with ceaseless toll, in favor of a
stone which you could melt at one go
and pour while hot into ready made
mold! 1t must have looked, by compar-
ison, like weapon-making by magic; for
properly to cut and polish a stone axe is
the work of weeks and weeks of elbow
grease. Yet here, in a moment, bet
ter Ratchet could be turned out all fin
ished! But the implied effects lay
deeper far than the neolithic hunter
could ever have imagined. The bronze
axe was the beginning Of civilization; it
brought the steam engine, the tele-
phone, woman's rights and the county
councillor in its train. With the eye of
faith, had he only possessed that useful
optical organ. the Stone Age artisan
m light doubtless have beheld the de-
ceased wife's sister looming dimly in
the remote future. Till that moment.
human life had been almost stationary:
henceforth it proceeded by leaps and
bounds, like kangaroo society, on it's
upward path toward triumphant de-
mocracy and the penny post. The nine
teenth century and all it's wiles hung by
a thread upon the success of his melt
ing-pot. Magazine.