Page:Early Man in Britain and His Place in the Tertiary Period.djvu/440

412 From this it may be inferred that the supply of bronze was obtained from some one centre, and that afterwards articles were manufactured with various local modifications of the original models. These would be very easily produced, from the readiness with which moulds could be made in soft materials, such as clay and sand. In this manner the resemblances and the differences between the European bronzes may be satisfactorily explained.

The observations of Worsaae on the colonisation of Russia and North Scandinavia, and the recent work of Kohn and Mehlis, prove that the bronzes of Germany, Scandinavia, western Europe, and the Mediterranean, are not derived from the great plains of Russia, extending to the Urals and the Caucasus, since the bronze implements in those districts are unlike those of the rest of Europe, and are to a large extent of a later date. The only other region from which bronze could have been derived is Asia Minor. In Worsaae's opinion it was introduced by way of the Bosphorus. It was probably discovered in some metalliferous region in central Asia, from which it was distributed by means of barter, as well as by the migrations of peoples, from such a centre, for example, as Khorasan, mentioned in treating of the distribution of tin. If this view be accepted, it will follow that bronze was used in the south long before it was known in the north of Europe; and the