covered at Burnham, Great Missenden, Iver, Langley, Marlow, and Taplow.
The Neolithic Age
From what has been said as to the termination of the palæolithic age in this country, it will be understood that there can have been no intimate relation between the people of the old stone age and those of the new stone age. By the beginning of the neolithic age the general appearance of the country had assumed practically the same shape, form, and condition it now possesses. Forests and woodlands were more abundant, but the main features of river and valley, moorland and hill, which characterise the England of the present day, had already received their forms.
Of the neolithic age, just as in the case of the palæolithic age, the most numerous and characteristic archaeological remains are implements, weapons, etc., formed of stone, usually flint. There is, however, this difference between the two groups : the earlier, or palæolithic work is boldly, broadly, and skilfully chipped, and this by means of a very few blows: the neolithic work, on the other hand, displays, it is true, a greater delicacy and elaboration of form, pointing to a somewhat extensive system of specialization of use, the implements being shaped by less vigorous and more numerous blows. Again, whilst the palæolithic implements never show a trace of shaping by grinding, the neolithic implements frequently do so, particularly in the case of those weapons or implements which approach a chisel- or axe-like form.
The neolithic people evidently belonged to a race entirely different and distinct from the palæolithic; and whilst an attempt has been made by some writers to demonstrate the existence of a transitional period, which they call mesolithic, connecting the palæolithic and neolithic periods, the theory is not generally accepted.
Although the most numerous relics of the neolithic age are stone implements, they are not by any means the only remains. Camps, hut- floors, and possibly roads or trackways still remain in some parts of England to testify to the civilization of the neolithic inhabitants.
At Hitcham, in Buckinghamshire, some circular hut-floors constructed partly below the level of the ground were discovered, and whilst the recorded account[1] seems to suggest that they are of the bronze age, the general form of the floors is strikingly like that of neolithic floors elsewhere. The discovery of bronze-age pottery in and around them may point to a subsequent occupation in the bronze age on the site of neolithic huts.
In the neighbourhood of Hitcham and Taplow numerous neolithic implements, etc., have been discovered. These comprise flint axes, lance-heads, arrow-heads, scrapers, flakes, waste chips, etc. In the neighbourhood of Bledlow, which lies close to the Chiltern Hills, the writer has observed numerous flint flakes and scrapers, lying on the
- ↑ Eighth Report of the Maidenhead and Taplow Field Club, p. 46.
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