In the chief countries of Celtic civilisation, Gaul, Cisalpine and Transalpine, Britain and Ireland, abundant materials have been found for elucidating the stages of culture through which man passed in prehistoric times.

In Britain, for example, palaeolithic man has left numerous specimens of his implements, but the forms even of these rude implements suggest that they, too, have been evolved from still more primitive types.

Some antiquarians have thought to detect such earlier types in the stones that have been named 'eoliths' found in Kent, but, though these 'eoliths' may possibly show human use, the question of their history is far from being settled.

It is certain, however, that man succeeded in maintaining himself for ages in the company of the mammoth, the cave-bear, and other animals now extinct.

Whether palaeolithic man survived the Ice Age in Britain has not so far been satisfactorily decided.