The great Ice Age, or Glacial Period, was a time when a great
mass of ice came down gradually from the north and covered parts of the world. It
came down over North America, and a similar mass of ice came down over northern
Europe and western Siberia. When did this happen? It is thought that it began
nearly 1,000,000 years ago.
When did it end? In the United Kingdom it may have ended
only a few thousand years ago, and in some parts of the world it still has not
really ended. The glacial period still remains in Antarctica and Greenland. Mllions
of square miles of central Europe were buried under a great creeping ice sheet
which reached as far south as London, Rumania and the southern tip of Russia.
When the Ice Age came, animals from the Arctic migrated
south-ward in front of the glaciers. Animals which could not stand the new, colder
conditions were forced to migrate to warmer regions, or die out. Native wild
animals now only found in America are merely a remant of the many varieties of
beasts known to have lived there before the Ice Age.
Man, of course, was able to adapt his lift to the colder
climate. This probably helped him gain in intelligence because more difficult
living conditions made him use his mind and ingenuity in order to survive. Plant
life also moved south In front of the glaciers, and moved back again as the
glaciers melted. But many kinds of plant simply died out.
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