In remote times bleak and exposed sites in the east of the county of Durham were occupied by folk who made microlithic implements. On the top of Sheddon's Hill, near the Black Fell, Gateshead, these relics were fairly abundant among hundreds of pieces of flint collected; and examples have been found elsewhere in the district and on the coast.

Many of the Belgian Tardenois types are represented among these finds, the small trapezoid which has not yet been excavated on Sheddon's Hill was found on a site near by and a small round scraper on a coast site. The finding of these remains on Sheddon's Hill adds something to our information about the distribution of the Tardenois folk in Britain who probably as Capt. Buckley has suggested spread westwards from the Continent at a time when the North Sea did not exist.