"The discovery of bronze, and the knowledge of how to make it, may, as a
mere intellectual effort, be regarded as rather above than below the
effort which is involved in the discovery and use of iron. As regards
bronze, there is first the discovery of copper, and the way of getting
it from its ore; then the discovery of tin, and the way to get it from
its ore; and then the further discovery that, by an admixture of tin
with copper in proper proportions, an alloy with the qualities of a hard
metal can be produced. It is surely no mistake to say that there goes
quite as much thinking to this as to the getting of iron from its ore,
and the conversion of that iron into steel. There is a considerable leap
from stone to bronze, but the leap from bronze to iron is comparatively
small. . . . It seems highly improbable, if not altogether absurd, that
the human mind, at some particular stage of its development, should
here, there, and everywhere--independently, and as the result of
reaching that stage--discover that an alloy of copper and tin yields a
hard metal useful in the manufacture of tools and weapons. There is
nothing analogous to such an occurrence in the known history of human
progress. It is infinitely more probable that bronze was discovered in
one or more centres by one or more men, and that its first use was
solely in such centre or centres. That the invention should then be
perfected, and its various applications found out, and that it should
thereafter spread more or less broadly over the face of the earth, is a
thing easily understood."

We will find the knowledge of bronze wherever the colonies of Atlantis
extended, and nowhere else; and Plato tells us that the people of
Atlantis possessed and used that metal.

The indications are that the Bronze Age represents the coming in of a