We can read of things that happened 5,000 years ago in the Near East, where people first learned to write.
我们可以读到 5000 年前发生在近东的事情，那里的人们最早学会了书写。
But there are some parts of the world where even now people cannot write.
但在世界上的某些地方，人们至今仍无法书写。
The only way that they can preserve their history is to recount it as sagas -- legends handed down from one generation of story tellers to another.
他们保存历史的唯一方式就是以传奇的形式讲述历史，即一代又一代讲故事的人流传下来的传说。
These legends are useful because they can tell us something about migrations of people who lived long ago, but none could write down what they did.
这些传说很有用，因为它们可以告诉我们很久以前人们迁徙的情况，但没有人能够写下他们所做的事情。
Anthropologists wondered where the remote ancestors of the Polynesian peoples now living in the Pacific Islands came from.
人类学家想知道，现在生活在太平洋岛屿上的波利尼西亚人的远祖来自何方。
The sagas of these people explain that some of them came from Indonesia about 2,000 years ago.
这些人的传奇故事解释说，他们中的一些人大约在 2000 年前来自印度尼西亚。
But the first people who were like ourselves lived so long ago that even their sagas, if they had any, are forgotten.
但是，最早的波利尼西亚人和我们一样生活在很久以前，即使他们有传奇故事，也已经被遗忘了。
So archaeologists have neither history nor legends to help them to find out where the first 'modern men' came from.
因此，考古学家既没有历史，也没有传说来帮助他们找出第一批 "现代人 "来自哪里。
Fortunately, however, ancient men made tools of stone, especially flint, because this is easier to shape than other kinds.
不过，幸运的是，古人用石头，特别是燧石制作工具，因为这种工具比其他种类的工具更容易成型。
They may also have used wood and skins, but these have rotted away.
他们也可能使用过木头和皮革，但这些都已经腐烂了。
Stone does not decay, and so the tools of long ago have remained when even the bones of the men who made them have disappeared without trace.
石头不会腐烂，因此，当制造工具的人的骸骨消失得无影无踪时，很久以前的工具却依然存在。
ROBIN PLACE Finding fossil manPolished axeheads found at Seamers Moor in Yorkshire
罗宾-普莱斯 寻找人类化石在约克郡的 Seamers Moor 发现的抛光斧头
