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covered of the animals they reared or obtained in the chase, the
crops and fruit they grew, their fishing appliances, the methods
of hafting their stone implements, and even the textile fabrics
that they wove. Similar pile-dwellings are still used by the
natives in the East Indies, the Gold Coast, &c.
THE BRONZE AGE.
The Bronze Age is marked by a great and far-reaching
advance in human culture, the art of smelting metals, a discovery
which caused a rapid development of human ideas.
Fig. 10. Cinery Urn from a Fig. 11. Vessel known as the
barrow in Derbyshire ; Drinking Cup from a barrow-
height 14 inches. in Derbyshire.
The invention of Bronze seems to have been preceeded by a
period when copper only was used, but this was a local peculiarity
and does not appear to have been of long duration, though
probably many objects of copper were melted up in later times
as the advantage of bronze became known. It was only by very
gradual steps that the use of bronze superseded that of stone and
it did not entirely supplant it, both materials being concurrently
used. The superiority of bronze gradually asserted itself, and
its use lasted about 1,000 years. A few centuries before the
Christian Era it in turn was superseded by the more useful
metal iron. With the discovery of bronze, art received a great