proved that the civilization of man has been
gradually developed from an original stone-age culture, such as
characterizes modern savage life. To the 6000 years to which ancient
civilization dates back must be added a vast period during which the
knowledge, arts and institutions of such a civilization as that of
ancient Egypt attained the high level evidenced by the earliest records.
The evidence of comparative philology supports the necessity for an
enormous time allowance. Thus, Hebrew and Arabic are closely related
languages, neither of them the original of the other, but both sprung
from some parent language more ancient than either. When, therefore, the
Hebrew records have carried back to the most ancient admissible date the
existence of the Hebrew language, this date must have been long preceded
by that of the extinct parent language of the whole Semitic family;
while this again was no doubt the descendant of languages slowly shaping
themselves through ages into this peculiar type. Yet more striking is
the evidence of the Indo-European (formerly called Aryan) family of
languages. The Hindus, Medes, Persians, Greeks, Romans, Germans, Celts
and Slavs make their appearance at more or less remote dates as nations
separate in language as in history. Nevertheless, it is now acknowledged
that at some far remoter time, before these nations were divided from
the parent stock, and distributed over Asia and Europe, a single
barbaric people stood as physical and political representative of the
nascent Aryan race, speaking a now extinct Aryan language, from which,
by a series of modifications not to be estimated as possible within many
thousands of years, there arose languages which have been mutually
unintelligible since the dawn of history, and between which it was only
possible for an age of advanced philology to trace the fundamental
relationship.

From the combination of these considerations, it will be seen that the
farthest date to which documentary or other records extend is now
generally regarded by anthropologists as but the earliest distinctly
visible point of the historic period, beyond which stretches back a vast
indefinite series of prehistoric ages.

V. _Language._--In examining how the science of language bears on the
general problems of anthropology, it is not necessary to discuss at
length the critical questions which arise, the principal of which are
considered elsewhere (see LANGUAGE). Philology is especia