"The Dawn of History: An Introduction to Pre-Historic Study" by C. F. Keary. Published by Good Press. Good Press publishes a wide range of titles that encompasses every genre. From well-known classics & literary fiction and non-fiction to forgotten−or yet undiscovered gems−of world literature, we issue the books that need to be read. Each Good Press edition has been meticulously edited and formatted to boost readability for all e-readers and devices. Our goal is to produce eBooks that are user-friendly and accessible to everyone in a high-quality digital format.
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C. F. Keary. The Dawn of History: An Introduction to Pre-Historic Study
The Dawn of History: An Introduction to Pre-Historic Study
Table of Contents
THE. DAWN OF HISTORY:
PREFACE
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION
THE DAWN OF HISTORY. CHAPTER I. THE EARLIEST TRACES OF MAN
CHAPTER II. THE SECOND STONE AGE
CHAPTER III. THE GROWTH OF LANGUAGE
CHAPTER IV. FAMILIES OF LANGUAGE
CHAPTER V. THE NATIONS OF THE OLD WORLD
CHAPTER VI. EARLY SOCIAL LIFE
CHAPTER VII. THE VILLAGE COMMUNITY
CHAPTER VIII. RELIGION
CHAPTER IX. ARYAN RELIGIONS
CHAPTER X. THE OTHER WORLD
CHAPTER XI. MYTHOLOGIES AND FOLK-TALES
CHAPTER XII. PICTURE-WRITING
CHAPTER XIII. PHONETIC WRITING
CHAPTER XIV. CONCLUSION
APPENDIX. NOTES AND AUTHORITIES
CHAPTERS I. AND II
CHAPTERS III. AND IV
CHAPTER V
CHAPTERS VI. AND VII
CHAPTERS VIII.-XI
CHAPTERS XII. AND XIII
CHAPTER XIV
INDEX
Отрывок из книги
C. F. Keary
Published by Good Press, 2021
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These drift implements, then, form a class apart—apart even from all other stone implements made by man, and probably earlier than any other class. Very simple and rude are these drift implements. It would require a skilled eye to detect any difference between most of them and a flint which had only been chipped by natural means. But the first thing to remember is, that the makers of these implements had nothing but other still ruder materials to help them in this manufacture of theirs. Metals of all kinds were as yet utterly unknown to man.
We who are so habituated to the employment of metal, either in the manufacture or the composition of every article which meets our eye, can scarcely realize that man lived long ages on the earth before the metals and minerals, its hidden treasures, were revealed to him. This pen I write with is of metal, or, were it a quill, it would still have been shaped by the use of steel; the rags of which this paper is made up have been first cut by metal knives, then bleached by a mineral (chlorine), then torn on a metal cylinder, then thrown into a vat which was either itself of metal or had been shaped by metal tools, then drawn on a wire-cloth, etc. And so it is with everything which is made nowadays. We can scarcely think of any single manufacture in which is not traceable the paramount influence of man’s discoveries beneath the surface of the ground. But primitive man could profit by no such inherited knowledge, and had only begun to acquire some powers which he could transmit to his own descendants. For his tools he must look to the surface of the earth only; and the hardest substances he could find were stones. Not only during the period of which we are now speaking, but for hundreds, perhaps thousands, of years lasted man’s ignorance of the metals, ignorance therefore of all that the metals could produce for him. The long age of this state of ignorance is distinguished in pre-history by the name of the Stone Age, because the hardest things then known to mankind were stones, and the most important of his implements and utensils had therefore to be made of stones.
