“STONE AGE” PEOPLE.

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXV, Issue 18202, 1 March 1929, Page 9

“STONE AGE” PEOPLE.

DISCOVERIES IN MONGOLIA. ‘Has the cradle of the human race actually been discovered?” This question was eagerly put, during a meeting recently at the New Oxford I* Cambridge Club, London, to Dr Roy Chapman Andrews, world famous as the leader of the American Natural History Museum’s post-war explorations in Mongolia, who was on his way back to New York after two year’s absence in China. j 4 ‘Wo have discovered evidence,” he i replied, “which reveals the whole life history of a Stone Age people, who lived ill what is now the Gobi Desert between 20,000 and 25,000 years ’ago. There were millions of them. “It looks as if these are the originals of people who spread to France and Spain to the west and to America eastwards. Until wo have carefully examined the evidence, however, it is unwise to say more.” “The expeditions have now stretched oyer eight years,” Dr Andrews explained, “and this year we were able to ; cover an immense amount of ground because we used motor transport over a gravel resert in addition to camels. PEOPLE NUMBERED MILLIONS. “W e have found no human remains i whatever so far. Wo have nevertheless

discovered traces of a Stone Age culture which astonishes us. They proved the existence of a people who numbered millions. “Hitherto we havo thought of primitive men as little groups of families living in caves and rock shelters. We have discovered, however, three or four hundred points of ‘dunes,’ where large

communities lived. “We have also evidence of a reliable kind which tells us exactly how they lived down the ages, and can trace their culture over a period of 30.000 j years. Tho stone implements number | thousands. These people did not Jive in natural shelters, but probably used stretched skins of animals to provide shelter. i “They were great hunters, clever, and courageous. They hunted the wild ass i and the antelope. As time went on ■ they made bows and arrows-. They also trapped and netted birds. They ate frogs. Their implement-making faotorist suggest some ways of making ! flint implements scarcity realised by those who* have studied the subject. In some extraordinary way they were able to push flakes off cores of stone instead of striking them off. Their jasper arrowheads are marvellous. “Afore important than these, howof the later peoples. Ido not suggest that they knew anything of agriculture or of the potter’s wheel, but we have found articles which seem to have been used for grinding seeds-, and as receptacles. “Wo have got bits of pottery which seem to have- been baked, and have certainly been decorated by little When Dr Andrews was asked to explain the absence of human remains he replied ; “The conditions are not good for the preservation of bones. We have not, however, made a really thorough search. There is a vallev which we know of that will have to ho carefully combed by a future expedition. it simply teems with remains.”