The Age of the Gods

XIV. The Bronze Age in Central Europe and the Formation of the Indo-European Peoples

230 xiv The Bronze Age in Central Europe and the Formation of the Indo-European Peoples i. the european bronze age and its origins The age of empires in the Near east finds its counterpart in europe in the Mycenæan period of greece and the continental Bronze age. This is an important phase of the development of european culture , for it marks the transition between the prehistoric and the historic worlds. during its course the peoples and cultures which emerge into the light of history in the following epoch were already in the process of formation. Moreover, it was during this age that europe first acquired a certain measure of cultural unity. The earlier neolithic peasant cultures and the hunting and food-gathering cultures of a yet more primitive type were almost entirely self-sufficing and, like the savage peoples of modern times, could follow the same unchanging course of existence for ages. But the use of metal at once brought with it a wide extension of trade and intercommunication, and led to the diffusion of common types of weapons and implements, and thus the earliest centres of metal-working became also centres of cultural influences which penetrated far and wide through europe. In this way the achievements of the early metal-working cultures of the Near east were gradually diffused throughout the length and breadth of europe, and gave the initial impetus to the development of the different regional types which became characteristic of the later phases of the Bronze age. Thus european culture acquired a much more complex character The European Bronze Age 231 than it had possessed in neolithic times. While the old cultures were, so to speak, simple and uniform organisms, those of the Bronze age were made up of a number of different elements. In the first place the cultures of the previous age still remained as a kind of permanent substratum which underlies all the later developments . This peasant foundation was an indispensable condition in the existence of a higher type of culture, and where it was absent, as in Central Russia for example, we see the new metal-using culture making a temporary appearance and passing away again without leaving any permanent mark on the culture of the region. on the other hand, it was in Central europe, where the peasant culture of the danubian type was most firmly established, that the subsequent development of the Bronze age was most important and had the widest influence on the rest of europe. and the distinction between the main types of neolithic culture—that of the danubian peasants, that of the alpine lakedwellers , and that of the western megalith builders, survived to some extent into the new age and formed one of the principal elements in the evolution of the new regional cultures. Nevertheless, the new development of civilisation did not proceed directly from these peasant populations . The Bronze age was preceded, as we have seen in Chapter XII, by a series of invasions by warrior peoples, which broke through the old cultural frontiers, and, by their conquest of the native neolithic population, formed new mixed types of peoples and cultures. To a certain extent these invasions were destructive of the Peasant Culture, and in some parts of europe agriculture declined and the population shifted to the uplands and the fringes of the forest which were more suited to the life of a pastoral and hunting people. But the change was not wholly retrograde. The warrior chieftains were richer and more powerful than the old peasant communities. They needed horses, and weapons, and ornaments, and thus they were the element in the population that had most to do with the use and diffusion of the new metals . It is even possible that their conquests may have been influenced to some extent by economic motives: that the Beaker people penetrated to Bohemia on account of its wealth in minerals, and that the amber of Jutland and the salt deposits of Thuringia first attracted the Battle-axe people to those regions. Indeed, we have seen in a previous chapter 232 The Age of the Gods that the Battle-axe people of Thuringia appear on the Lower oder as traders rather than migratory barbarians. In any case, when the power of the warrior peoples was once established, their influence would tend to stimulate trade and lead to the opening up of new routes and the...