1897.] Early Man in Scotland. 391 



WEEKLY EVENING MEETING, 

 Friday, March 26th, 1897. 



Sib James Criohton-Browne, M.D. LL.D. F.R.S. Treasurer 

 and Vice-President, in the Chair. 



Sir William Turner, D.C.L. LL.D. F.R.S. 



Early Man in Scotland. 



In Scotland, as in other countries, man existed before the time of 

 written history. The conditions under which his remains are found, 

 and the works which he has left behind him, provide the data for 

 determining their age, not absolutely or capable of being expressed 

 in numbers of years, but relatively to each other. 



Marked differences existed in the physical conditions of Scotland, 

 and indeed in the northern parts of England also, as compared with 

 the southern districts of England and the adjoining parts of France 

 and Belgium at the first appearance of primeval man in those countries . 

 It is the more necessary, therefore, that the conditions then prevailing 

 in Scotland should not be overlooked. 



No evidence sufficient to satisfy geologists has been advanced to 

 prove that man existed in Britain during the period called Tertiary. 

 So far, indeed, as Scotland is concerned, evea if it were admitted that 

 in other parts of the globe man had been on the earth during Tertiary 

 times, there is little likelihood that his remains could have been pre- 

 served ; for in that country the Tertiary is represented chiefly by 

 volcanic rocks, and a few patches of sand and gravel with rolled sea 

 shells belonging to the closing stages of that period. 



From the careful study which geologists have given to the surface 

 of Scotland, it is evident that at the commencement of the period 

 termed Quaternary or Pleistocene, immediately succeeding the Ter- 

 tiary, the whole of the country was covered with ice which formed a 

 great sheet 3000 or 4000 feet thick in the low grounds, of which 

 the lower boulder clay, or till, as it is termed, was the ground- 

 moraine. 



As an upper boulder clay also occurs, which is often separated 

 from the lower boulder clay by stratified deposits, some of which 

 contained marine and other fresh water and terrestrial organic remains, 

 it is obvious that the Ice Age was not one uninterrupted period of con- 

 tinuous cold.* The lower and upper tills are the ground-moraines of 



* For the evidence on which these statements are based, consult the ' Great 

 Ice Age,' by Professor James Geikie, edition 1894, also liis 'Classification of 

 European Glacial Deposits,' in Journal of Geology, vol, iii. April-May, 1895. 



2 D 2 



