EARLY MAN THE prehistoric antiquities of Sussex are very important and numerous, and entitle the county to a position second only to Kent among the counties of the south-east of England. Every sub-division of the prehistoric period is represented by the con- tents of the museums at Lewes, Chichester, Brighton, Hastings and East- bourne, and by other objects found in Sussex which are in the British Museum and in various private collections. To attempt to describe in detail all these antiquities would be impossible within the scope of the present article. A topographical list of discoveries at the end of this article, and a map marked so as to show the distribution of prehistoric antiquities of various kinds throughout the county, will, it is hoped, make it easy to form an idea of the evidences upon which the earliest part of the story of Sussex is founded. The prehistoric era, commencing with the first appearance of man and ending with the Roman occupation of Britain, is usually divided into the following sections or ages : (i) Palseolithic Age, (2) Neolithic Age, (3) Bronze Age, and (4) Prehistoric Iron Age. It is proposed to follow this arrangement in dealing with the subject of Early Man in Sussex, but at the very beginning it may be well to explain that these several ages must be regarded, not as indicating particular periods of time, but as representing successive stages in culture. As far as Sussex and Britain generally are concerned there is reason to believe that the first appearance of man is associated with the Paleo- lithic Age, when stone tools were shaped by chipping and when the grinding or polishing of stone was an unknown art. The ' Eolithic Age,' as it has been called, which by some is supposed to have preceded the Pala2olithic, and to be represented by tools of immensely ruder types, is not universally accepted, and further evidence must be produced before the suspiciously irregular forms of what have been called ' eolithic implements ' can be acknowledged to have been formed by man. The Paleolithic Age It is usual to consider this the earlier of the two ages of stone, and there can be no question that such was the case, but the use of the term ' Stone Age ' is perhaps open to the objection that it seems to imply that stone alone was used for tools, weapons, and other articles. If the term ' Pre-metallic Age ' could be substituted it would perhaps prevent the 309
