countries, and for an immense variety of purposes."
As soon as the metallurgic art had taken root among the prehistoric people of Europe each country began to manufacture its own bronze objects, modelling them, in the first instance, after their analogues in stone, or imported metal specimens. Such a derivative connection can be traced not only between the flat bronze axe and the stone celt, but also between most of the other bronze implements and weapons and their prototypes in non-metallic materials. The original safety-pin occupies an intermediate stage between the primitive bone or bronze pin and the highly ornamented brooches, which were in use among the Celts, Saxons and Scandinavians. Such evolutionary connections are often obscure, until all the intermediate links of a series are exhibited side by side.
In describing briefly the Bronze Age relics we must not fall into the common error of supposing that we are dealing with a brand new civilization. The social organizations already founded by the Stone Age people are simply continued, but carried out with greater efficiency, in consequence of the substitution of bronze in their cutting and penetrating tools for the less effective materials formerly used.
Implements.—The division of axes into flat, flanged, winged and socketed, not only sufficiently defines these forms, so far as any classification is necessary, but also indicates
