DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.67683#0023
PALEOLITHIC AGE
3
MINOR ARTS
Fig. i. Flint Implements of the Chase,
Fishing, and Industry. L. 2.-4 in.
thirty thousand years ago, the climate became chilly. Reindeer
were abundant, a fact that suggests the name sometimes given to
the period — the Reindeer Age. Man, like the animals, migrated
or adapted himself to the
change, finding shelter in
caves or under shelving
rocks, and clothing himself
with the skins of the larger
animals that he now could
more easily
overcome with
his stone wea-
pons. For in
the long ages
since he first
evolved his
fist-hatchet he
had made a
great advance in the number and quality of his
tools (Fig. 2.). He had learned how to make knives
with stems for attaching a wooden handle, spear-
heads, awls, drills, and fine points for engraving,
all of which were carefully shaped with a feeling
for symmetry. The fine edges and points were
made by pressing against the stone with a piece of
bone, rather than by chipping it with stone, the
method used in making the fist-hatchet. These tools
were sharp enough to cut bone, ivory, and horn,
from which men now fashioned implements and
weapons of the chase, for they were primarily
hunters in this last cold period.
Fig. 3. Dart-
Thrower. Of One of the important implements of this early
io| in^Piette)4' aSe was t^le dart-thrower (Figs. 3 and 4), into
2 ’ which the hunter inserted the spear so as to increase
the power of his arm in hurling the weapon. The noticeable
thing about the dart-thrower is its decoration: the bone has
been carved into the shape of an antelope, and very skillfully the
animal form has been adapted to the cylindrical surface of the
implement, the curved horns encircling the shape snugly and the
whole forming an appropriate and effective piece of decoration.
3
MINOR ARTS
Fig. i. Flint Implements of the Chase,
Fishing, and Industry. L. 2.-4 in.
thirty thousand years ago, the climate became chilly. Reindeer
were abundant, a fact that suggests the name sometimes given to
the period — the Reindeer Age. Man, like the animals, migrated
or adapted himself to the
change, finding shelter in
caves or under shelving
rocks, and clothing himself
with the skins of the larger
animals that he now could
more easily
overcome with
his stone wea-
pons. For in
the long ages
since he first
evolved his
fist-hatchet he
had made a
great advance in the number and quality of his
tools (Fig. 2.). He had learned how to make knives
with stems for attaching a wooden handle, spear-
heads, awls, drills, and fine points for engraving,
all of which were carefully shaped with a feeling
for symmetry. The fine edges and points were
made by pressing against the stone with a piece of
bone, rather than by chipping it with stone, the
method used in making the fist-hatchet. These tools
were sharp enough to cut bone, ivory, and horn,
from which men now fashioned implements and
weapons of the chase, for they were primarily
hunters in this last cold period.
Fig. 3. Dart-
Thrower. Of One of the important implements of this early
io| in^Piette)4' aSe was t^le dart-thrower (Figs. 3 and 4), into
2 ’ which the hunter inserted the spear so as to increase
the power of his arm in hurling the weapon. The noticeable
thing about the dart-thrower is its decoration: the bone has
been carved into the shape of an antelope, and very skillfully the
animal form has been adapted to the cylindrical surface of the
implement, the curved horns encircling the shape snugly and the
whole forming an appropriate and effective piece of decoration.