Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1922-10-17
The Outline of History-By H. G. Wells
/. The Romance of Mother Earth

light for going deeply into the caverns would
be torches.
What did those Neanderthal men hunt?
Their only possible weapons for killing such
giant creatures as the mammoth or the cave
bear, or even the reindeer, were spears of
wood, wooden clubs, and those big pieces OF
flint they left behind them the "Chellean"
and "Mousterian" Implements; and probably
their usual quarry was smaller game But
they did certainly eat the flesh of the big
rbeasts when they had a chance, and perhaps
| they followed them when sick or when
wounded by combat, or took advantage OF
them when they were begged or in trouble
with ice or water. (The Labrador Indians
still kill the caribou with spears at awkward
river crossings.)
At Dewlish, in Dorset, an artificial trench
has been found which is supposed to have
been Palaeolithic trap for elephants. We
know that the Neanderthalers partly ate their
kill where it fell; but they brought back the
big marrow bones to the cave to crack and
eat at leisure, because few ribs and vertebrae
are found in the caves, but great quantities
of cracked and split long bones They used
skins to wrap about them, and the women
probably dressed the skins
We know also that they were because the
left side Of the brain (Which serves the right
side of the body is bigger than the right.
But while the back parts of the brain which
deal with sight and touch and the energy OF
/ the body are well developed, the front parts,
which are connected with thought and speech,
are comparatively small. 1t was as big a
brain as ours, but different. This species or
Homo had certainly I; very different mental
ity from ours; it's individuals were not mere
ly simpler and lower than we are, they were
on another line. 1t may be they did not
speak at all, or very sparingly. They had
nothing that we should call language
TheA"O1d Man.
In Worthington Smiths "Man the Prime
val Savage there is very wildly written
| description of early Palaeolithic life, from
which much of the following accounts is bor-
| rowed. In the original, Mr.. Worth1ngton
| Smith assumes more extensive social life, 9
| larger community, and a more definite d1vls-
| ion of labor among it's members than is alto
gether iustifiable in the face Of such subse-
| quent writings ASH. J. Atkinson's memorable
essay on Primal Law: For the little trfpe Mr
! Worthington Smith described, there has been
| substituted, therefore, family group under
! the leadership of one Old Man, and the sug-
gestions Of Mr.. Atkinson as to the behavior
| of the Old Man have been worked into the
| sketch.
| Mr., Worthington Smith describes squat
| ting-place near a stream, because primitive
man, having no pots or other vessels, must
needs have kept close to a water supply, and
| with some chalk cliffs adjacent from which
| flints could be got to work. The air was
| bleak, and the fire was OF great Importance
because fires once out were not easily rel1t
to those days. When not required to- blaze
| it was probably banked down with ashes. The
most probable way in which fires were start
ed was by hacking bit of iron pyrites with
flint amidst dry dead leaves; connections OF
| iron pyrites and flints are found together in
England where the gauit and chalk approach
each other. The little group Of people would
be squatting about amidst a litter of fern
moss, and such-like dry material. Some
of the women and children would need to be
continually gathering fuel to keep up the
fires. 1t would be tradition that had grown
{n1;f a%A hoir oil
this task. Perhaps there would be rude wind
shelters of boughs on one side of the en-
campment
Copyright, 1929