260 Oeological Society. 



PllOCEE DINGS OF LEARNED SOCIETTES. 



GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



December 2nd, 1914. — Dr. A. SmiHi Woodward, F.R.S., President, 



ill the Chair. 



The following communication was read : — 



*0n the Age and Character of the Shippea Hill Man.' 

 By Prof. T. McKenny Hughes, M.A., F.R.S., F.G.S. 



The Author first gives a general description of the skeleton, and 

 of the position and circumstances in which it was found. 



He then discusses the mode of formation of the deposit in which 

 the remains occurred, and the limits within which, from that point 

 of view, we may speculate as to their age. 



He considers that the Pleistocene deposits of the Fenland were 

 laid down in a gradually depressed river-basin behind a breached 

 seaward barrier, and gives examples from adjoining areas of similar 

 geographical conditions. 



Gravels of the age of 'Eleplias anfiqnus ?LXidi Bhinoceras merckii, 

 as well as gravels of the age of Eleplias lyrimicjenins and HMno- 

 ceros tichorhinus, occm- vfithin the Fenland; but they are easily 

 distinguished from the gravels which are sometimes associated 

 with the peat and clay, and pass under them. The fauna also of 

 the peat- and clay-deposits is quite different. 



This area was gradually depressed, and the conflict between the 

 upland waters and the sea went on through both the ages just 

 referred to, as shown by the earlier Corhicula Bed of March and 

 the newer Cockle Bed of Littleport. 



In an embayed part of the Fen, close behind the island known 

 as Shippea Hill, the skeleton was found in the peat, a few inches 

 above the clay which the Author considers to be the equivalent of 

 this Littleport Cockle Bed. 



When first dug out the skull was in fragments, and the calotte, 

 with its prominent brow-ridges, suggested to many a greater 

 affinity to the Neanderthal type, and a greater antiquity than 

 appeared probable when the rest of the cranium was added to it. 



In a preliminary notice published by the Author, he claimed that 

 it could not be older than Neolithic, and suggested that it might 

 be even as late as the time of the monks of Ely, who had a retreat 

 on the island close by. 



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