ANTIQUITY OF MAN IN AMERICA NELSON 473 



tradition, which divided the known world into three parts — Europe, 

 Asia, and Africa — and recognized only three corresponding great 

 racial groups of mankind, the descendants, respectively, of Shem, 

 Ham, and Japhet, With the psychologically fascinating specula- 

 tions flowing largely from these premises concerning Indian origins 

 we are not now directly concerned; but it is only tardy justice to 

 Columbus to state that the latest consensus of scientific opinion tends 

 to vindicate his practical judgment as to the Asiatic affinities of the 

 American Indians. 



THE PROBLEM OF ANTIQUITY 



The question concerning the length of time the Indian had resided 

 in America could scarcel}^ have been formulated as a distinct or 

 vital topic until after the year 1858, when the truly geologic an- 

 tiquity of mankind in general was finally admitted by European 

 scientists. To be sure, already a full century before that date re- 

 ports had been published, for example by Peter Kalm,^ of early 

 eighteenth-century archeological discoveries in New Jersey which 

 hinted strongly of Quaternary age, but neither these nor the similar 

 and better authenticated finds in Europe at about the same date 

 (1700) received serious attention. As late as 1835-44, a Danish 

 naturalist ^ discovered in six separate Brazilian caves near Lagoa 

 Santa no less than 30 human skulls and skeletons, as well as traces 

 of artifacts in apparent association with the bones of living and 

 extinct animals ; but as he himself was not entirely convinced of the 

 contemporaneity of his associated finds, the occurrence appears to 

 have excited no particular attention. Even the numerous alleged 

 implemental and skeletal finds in the Tertiary gold-bearing gravels 

 of California during the 1850's passed unnoticed. The time was not 

 ripe for frank consideration, except by a few isolated investigators. 

 However convincing such discoveries appeared to the common man, 

 who presumably did not perceive their full implication, the medieval 

 scholars could not entertain their reality, and the forem.ost among 

 the scientifically minded, like Cuvier, hesitated in spite of the accu- 

 mulating evidence and resorted to every kind of explanation except 

 the obvious one. 



Parenthetically again, we may pause briefly to consider the 

 dilemma in which the men of learning, who relied implicitly on the 

 received ancient authorities, found themselves. Pagan classical 

 authors, it is true, had written vaguely about the early use of stone 

 implements, but Hebrew tradition was silent on the subject. If, 



*Kalm, Petor, Travels into North America, 2d ed., vol. 1, pp. 277-280, London, 1772. 



' Lund, P. W., Blik pan, Brasilicns Dyreverdon, etc., Kong. Dansk. Vid. Selsk. Nat. Math. 

 Afh., Niende Deel, pp. 195-6, Kjobenhavn, 1842. For English digest of Lund's views 

 see A. HrdliCka, Early man in South America, Bull. 52, Bur. Amer. Ethnol., pp. 153-65, 

 1912. 



