The Arctic Home in the Vedas c4.13

c4.13

based upon the fact that the stone implements of the Palæolithic age are found to be very rudely fashioned, being merely chipped into shape and never ground or polished as is the case with the implements of the new Stone age. Another characteristic of the Palæolithic period is that the implements of the period are found in places which plainly show a much greater antiquity than can be assigned to the remains of the Neolithic age, the relics of the two ages being hardly, if ever, found together. The third distinction between the Palæolithic and the Neolithic age is that the remains of the Palæolithic man are found associated with those of many great mammals, such as the cave bear, the mammoth and woolly-haired rhinoceros, that became either locally or wholly extinct before the appearance of the Neolithic man on the stage. In short, there is a kind of hiatus or break between the Palæolithic and Neolithic man requiring a separate classification and treatment for each. It may also be noted that the climatic conditions and the distribution of land and water in the Palæolithic period were different from those in the Neolithic period; while from the beginning of the Neolithic period the modern conditions, both geographical and climatic, have prevailed almost unaltered up to the present time.