MEN OF THE OLD STONE AGE 



321 



the nature and significance of the human 

 remains and the interpretation of their age, 

 the animals associated with them, and the 

 characteristic features of the implements. 

 Perhaps the outstanding feature of the book 

 is the fulness and excellence of the account 

 of the artistic achievements of the Upper 

 PahTolithic people of France and Spain, 

 which Professor Osborn was able to study in 

 company with the three distinguished authori- 

 ties on this subject to whom the book is dedi- 

 cated. 



Valuable as such a complete and impartial 

 review of all the evidence is to the student of 

 the problems of the childhood of mankind, 

 it is somewhat of a disappointment that 

 Professor Osborn has paid so much deference 

 to what has been written on this side of the 

 world, and has shown such excessive modesty 

 in refraining from dealing more boldly, and 

 on less conventional lines, with the interpre- 

 tation of the great mass of data he has brought 

 together. For no one is better equipped and 

 more favorably situated than he is for this 

 great work of reading the real meaning of the 

 information now available, and of viewing in 

 broader perspective the story of the Old 

 Stone age. On this side of the world we 

 should like to have had his views also on the 

 question of early man in America, and in fact 

 in the world at large, beyond the limited area 

 of Europe. But, as Professor Osborn has not 

 done all these things, we are none the less 

 grateful for the magnificent volume he has 

 provided. 



To review a large volume such as "Men of 

 the Old Stone Age," which itself is a con- 

 densed summary of a vast mass of material, is 

 no easy matter. What I propose to do is to 

 pick out of the rich matrix of Professor 

 Osborn's account the story of man himself, 

 and comment upon certain of its aspects. 



No human remains have yet come to light 

 which can be referred with certainty to a time 

 earlier than the Pleistocene. There are very 

 definite reasons for including the Javan fossil 

 Pithecanthropus within the human family, 

 but also for regarding it as the most primitive 

 member of that family, not on "the direct 

 ancestral line of the higher races of men." 



Most modern writers assign its age to the 

 early Pleistocene: but Professor Osborn, 

 without definitely denying this possibility, is 

 inclined to agree with Dubois' original claim 

 that it belongs to the uppermost Pliocene. 

 His reason is that the fossil elephants which 



occur in Java along with Pithecanthropus 

 are also found twenty-five hundred miles 

 away in the foothills of the Himalayas of 

 India, where they are regarded as of the 

 uppermost Pliocene age. But as allied spe- 

 cies did not arrive in Europe until early 

 Pleistocene times there is the po.ssibility that 

 the animals whose remains have been found 

 in Java, may also not have wandered east 

 before then. 



In any case a vast interval of time elapsed 

 before the only two other known members of 

 the human family earlier than Mousterian 

 man, died in the neighborhood of Piltdown 

 and Heidelberg respectively. 



We can only conjecture what was happen- 

 ing to the human family during this enor- 

 mously long period, in which its doings are 

 completely hidden from our gaze. But it is 

 certain that somewhere in Asia or Africa — 

 and it is important to emphasize the fact 

 that Africa north of the Sahara has never 

 been the home of the negro, as Professor 

 Osborn assumes, except sporadically during 

 the last fifty centuries — the parent stock of 

 apelike men, of which Pithecanthropus must 

 be regarded as an offshoot, aberrant alike in 

 structure and habitat, was working out its own 

 salvation, and from time to time budding ofT 

 colonies of which the Piltdown and Heidelberg 

 genera and the ancestors of the Neanderthal 

 and sapiens species are alone known to us. 



Dr. Smith Woodward and most of the 

 British geologists, estimate the age of the 

 Piltdown skull as almost, if not quite, as great 

 as that of the Heidelberg jaw. But Professor 

 Osborn regards the latter not only as defi- 

 nitely older, but even as much as twice as old, 

 while Pithecanthropus is four times as 

 ancient! This remarkable conclusion is 

 based upon the statement that "as the Pilt- 

 down man was found in deposits containing 

 pre-Chellean implements, he probably lived 

 in the last quarter of the Glacial epoch, 

 (not older than the Third Interglacial age) 

 and not in early Pleistocene times as esti- 

 mated by some British geologists," whereas 

 "all authorities agree that the jaw of Heidel- 

 berg is probably of Second Interglacial age." 



But whether or not there is this wide dis- 

 crepancy between the ages of the Piltdown 

 and Heidelberg remains, there is no doubt 

 that they represent distinct genera; and in 

 my opinion the former is definitely more 

 primitive and simian than the latter. 



It must not be forgotten that the Piltdown 



