246 



THE LATE LIEUT. -GENERAL PITT-RIVERS. 



science. Among other distinctions the General was elected a Fellow of the 

 Royal Society, had the title of D.C.L. conferred on him by Oxford University 

 and was for many years the President of the Anthropological Institute. 



He was born in 1827 and commenced his career of antiquarian research 

 under the guidance of Canon Greenwell during his explorations on the 

 Yorkshire Wolds. Among the pioneers who followed up the startling 

 discoveries of M. Boucher de Perthes, the General was the first to find 

 palaeolithic implements in the Thames valley near London, an account of 

 which was given in an important paper read at the Geological Society, 1872, ' 

 and which attracted much notice. 



In 1S81 he made the fortunate discovery of flint flakes and an implement 



From a bust executed by the late J. E. Boehm, R.A. 



embedded in the gravel of the Nile at Thebes. The Egyptians had cut their 

 tombs in this gravel after it had become indurated and it was from the sides 

 of these tombs that Gen. Pitt-Rivers chiselled the implements out of gravel 

 beneath stratified seams of sand and loam, thereby proving the use of flint 

 implements before the time of the building of Thebes and that they were con- 

 temporaneous with the gravel in which the tombs were found. (Jour. Antlirop. 

 Inst. (1882), Vol. xi., p. 382). 



In 1866 Gen. Pitt-Rivers drew attention to the discovery of piles found 

 near London Wall and Southwark in a paper read at the Anthropological 

 Institute, to which Munro has fully referred in his Lake Dicclliiigs 0/ Europe. 



I Tram. Gcol. Soc, vol. xxviii., p. 449. 



