1897] THE AUTHENTICITY OF PLATEAU MAN 333 



against the upper edges of the flint slabs and force off small flakes. 

 Then if the flint slab be moved and inverted, renewed pressure 

 would similarly crush the other edge, and thus account for the cases 

 in which both edges have been chipped. 



A fact which seems to me conclusive proof that the chipping 

 was due to pressure by some yielding material from above is sup- 

 plied by hollow flints. The decay of a sponge often leaves a hollow 

 in the middle of a flint block ; the edges of such hollows in plateau 

 flints are chipped in precisely the same way as the edges. The arti- 

 ficial chipping of such edges by blows from another stone would be 

 difficult, and the work would have been absolutely wasted to eolithic 

 man. But the forcing of the finer constituents of the gravel across 

 the hollows under the pressure from overlying material might easily 

 have produced these crushed and apparently worked edges. 



The view that the plateau flints show no sign of human work- 

 manship I am glad to find supported by the high authority of Sir 

 John Evans, who, in a letter of April 1896, said: " I see nothing 

 upon them that is undoubtedly the result of human work or use ; 

 on the contrary, the rolling and wearing of the edges seem to me 

 more probably caused by natural agencies — I see nothing but the 

 hand of nature upon them." After a careful study of specimens 

 lately selected as the most convincing by Mr Harrison himself, I 

 am in absolute agreement with this opinion. And as the chipping 

 of the flints was apparently caused by the action of extreme cold 

 upon the gravels, movements in which were produced by the action 

 of ice, I propose for these shaped flints the name of ' Glacioliths.' 



Wm. Cunnington. 



