Neolithic use of polished or ground stone tools, in contrast to the flaked stone tools used during the Paleolithic era. Neolithic people were skilled farmers, manufacturing a range of tools necessary for the tending, harvesting and processing of crops (such as sickle blades and grinding stones) and food production (e.g. pottery, bone implements). They were also skilled manufacturers of a range of other types of stone tools and ornaments, including projectile points, beads, and statuettes. But what allowed forest clearance on a large scale was the polished stone axe above all other tools. Together with the adze, fashioning wood for shelter,
Neolithic creolisation hypothesis Neolithic creolisation hypothesis The Neolithic creolisation hypothesis, first put forward by Marek Zvelebil in 1995, contributes to the Proto-Indo-European Urheimat issue and proposes a cultural melting pot in the Neolithic of Northern Europe of foreign Neolithic farmers and indigenous Mesolithic hunter-gatherer communities that resulted in the genesis of the Indo-European language family. The hypothesis holds that the linguistic and cultural influence of the Neolithic farmers was far greater than the persistence of their foreign gene pool. According to Zvelebil, the linguistic influence of indigenous hunter-gatherers predominated, but other archeologists, such as Marek Nowak, favor a scenario compatible to Colin Renfrew's