284 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



cranial arc. Thus Dr. Woodward inclines towards Prof. 

 Klaatsch's famous heresy that the apes are descended from 

 creatures who were in many respects almost human, although 

 of course he does not countenance the more extravagant part 

 of Klaatsch's hypothesis, in which that authority associates 

 particular apes with particular races of men — the gorilla with 

 the negro, and the orang with white men. 



Due weight should certainly be attached to the fact that in 

 the case of Eoanthropus a high forehead is associated with such 

 a primitive jaw. And the manlike skull of the young ape is 

 certainly a curious feature, although a tendency towards the 

 same rounded form may be seen in the foetus of many other 

 mammals besides apes, which robs this fact of much of its 

 importance. It must be remembered, however, that a low 

 receding forehead is universal among the lower Primates, 

 and hence was indubitably present in the more distant ancestors 

 of both Hominidce and Simiidce. Thus convincing proof is 

 necessary before we are justified in interpreting the low 

 forehead of the apes, of Pithecanthropus, and of neandertalensis 

 as a secondary acquirement ; for there is of course the alter- 

 native explanation that all these animals possess a low forehead 

 merely because their ancestors never had anything else. 

 This is at first sight the simpler theory, and the importance 

 of the mandibular symphysis, as a sign of kinship, is not 

 strengthened by an examination of the Heidelberg jaw. The 

 Piltdown and Heidelberg mandibles are compared in fig. 2. 

 It will be seen at once that the "ascending" (or vertical) 

 part of the ramus is much wider in the German specimen, and 

 that the whole conformation of the two bones is entirely dis- 

 similar. The first and second molar teeth are the same size in 

 the two jaws, but the Sussex specimen is much the larger 

 anteriorly, hence the larger front teeth. Now, Woodward 

 derives both sapiens and neandertalensis directly from Eoanthropus, 

 It is not quite clear where he would place heidelbergcnsis, but 

 since he is content to leave the latter species in the genus Homo, 

 he presumably regards it as a twig of the branch which gave rise 

 to the other two species. Now, it may be possible to derive 

 the relatively narrow jaw of a Neandertaler from the type of 

 mandible exhibited by Eoanthropus, but it is difficult to see how 

 heidelbergensis could have been evolved from the same source. 

 It has long been known that a shallow sigmoid notch and a 



