Page:Prehistoric Britain.djvu/110

102 But the most astounding change in regard to animal life was the domestication of a number of animals (dog, ox, horse, pig, sheep and goat), some of which were reared as pets, others for food, and others for their milk. Another innovation of far-reaching consequence to humanity appeared to have been practised at a very early date, viz. the cultivation of a number of cereals (wheat, barley and millet), fruits and a few plants. In addition to such changes in the physical environment, these Neolithic folk were in possession of equally novel methods in their domestic economy. They were skilled in the ceramic art, and in the manufacture of cloth by spinning and weaving wool and fibrous textures. In hunting the forest fauna they used, in addition to spears, lances and daggers, the bow and arrow. They built houses both for the dead and the living—thus showing that religion had become a governing principle in their social economy. But of the artistic taste of their Palæolithic predecessors they possessed not a vestige, and whatever they did by way of ornament consisted of a few incised scratches arranged in simple geometrical patterns.

It is quite evident that such radical changes, embracing nearly all departments of social life, were not adopted en bloc, nor in a short space of time. Alterations in the relative level of sea and land, on so large a scale as the submergence of half a continent, are generally the result of slow cosmical processes.