WHOLE VOL. SKELETAL REMAINS OF EARLY MAN HRDLICKA QI 



the locality in June, 1912, and they readily related, in cornpany with 

 Mr. Rosch, who kindly had brought him to the quarry, all the circum- 

 stances of the find. 



The deposits in which the specimen was discovered are located 

 near the village of Mauer, which lies in the picturesque Elsenz Valley, 

 six miles (10 km.) southeast from Heidelberg. They form the 

 moderately elevated undulating northern boundaries of the shallow 

 valley, at a distance of about 2 miles from the present bed of the river, 

 and represent in the main the Quaternary accumulations of the 

 stream. They consist of loess, sand, and gravels, with here and there, 

 in the deeper layers, isolated flat blocks of red sandstone (pi. 15). 



The portion of these deposits owned by Mr. Rosch, located about 

 500 paces north of the Mauer village, have now been worked, in open 

 manner, for upward of 30 years, in which time great quantities of 

 building sand have been removed. During this work, particularly 

 in the lower strata, the workingmen often unearthed fossil shells and 

 fossil bones of various Quaternary animals. Many of these specimens 

 found there way, mostly as gifts of Mr. Rosch, to the Heidelberg 

 University, and the diggings were repeatedly visited by scientific men, 

 among them Prof. Schoetensack. Both the owner and the workmen 

 were enjoined to watch for better preserved specimens, and particu- 

 larly for anything relating to the presence of man. 



On the date of the find, two of the laborers were working in un- 

 disturbed material at the base of the exposure, nearly 80 feet in depth 

 from the surface, when one of them suddenly brought out on his 

 shovel part of a massive lower jaw which the implement had struck 

 and cut in two. As the men knew it was worth while to carefully 

 preserve all fossils, the specimen was handled with some care. The 

 missing half was dug out, but the crowns of four of the teeth broken 

 by the shovel were not recovered. The men were struck at once with 

 the remarkable resemblance of the bone to a human lower jaw ; but 

 it looked to them too thick and large to be that of man. They called 

 Mr. Rosch and he also was bewildered ; but he recognized immedi- 

 ately that the specimen might be of considerable interest to Prof. 

 Schoetensack and so he took charge of it. Returning to the village he 

 telegraphed to the professor, who came the next day, and " once he 

 got hold of the specimen, he would no more let it out of his posses- 

 sion." He took it to Heidelberg, cleaned it, repaired it, and in 1908 

 ])ul)lished its description in an exemplary way.' Since then the valu- 



^ Schoetensack, Otto, Der Unterkiefer des Homo lieidclbergensis, aus don 

 Sanden von Mauer bei Heidelberg, pp. 1-67, 13 pis., Leipzig, 1908. 



