Neolithic Age, so-called because a new and improved mechanical principle then came into general use, viz. the art of polishing stone implements by rubbing them with some hard material, so as to give them a sharper cutting edge than was possible by the old process of chipping. How far we have travelled in time to reach this phase of culture we cannot say in so many years, or centuries, or even millenniums.
In our survey of the geography of Western Europe during the Palæolithic period, Britain was part of the European continent whose westward sea-board extended far into the Atlantic Ocean. The beds of the larger portion of the German Ocean, the English Channel and the Irish Sea were raised above the level of the Atlantic and formed the happy hunting- ground of our early forefathers. But from the earliest dawn of Neolithic times nearly the whole of these extensive plains and river valleys were transformed into great inland seas. Nothing was to be seen of their former condition but the roots of a few submerged forests cropping up here and there, at low-water mark. The last of the extinct mammals had already died out or disappeared from the British area, with the exception of a few stray specimens of the Irish elk, the reindeer and the wild bull (Bos primigenius), which lingered in a few isolated localities down to proto-historic times. In short, the fauna and flora characteristic of sub-Arctic regions had given place to those of a temperate climate.
