PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY i 49 



man, for assigning a date in the Pliocene epoch to even the later stages of human 

 evolution, or for referring that phenomenon to a time still more remote. The former 

 existence of a distinct type of mankind, Homo primigenius (neanderthalensis) , is now 

 firmly established. Yet as regards his forbears and associates, the evidence even now 

 available leaves much desired. The characters of Homo primigenius provide many 

 suggestions, but material confirmation in the form of actual specimens is limited to a 

 few fragments. On the theory of evolution, the former existence of a primitive type 

 such as Homo primigenius is in accordance with expectation. It is also reasonable to 

 suppose that this primitive type was once the sole representative of humanity, unaccom- 

 panied by any form more highly evolved. But doubt still persists as to whether the 

 Homo primigenius known to us (through the various remains enumerated above) was 

 always actually unaccompanied thus, even though it would seem that he alone was 

 present in a particular period (that termed " middle Palaeolithic "). Claims continue 

 in fact to be made on behalf of the recognition of the equal, and indeed of the greater, 

 antiquity to be assigned to another form of man, a type indistinguishable in essentials 

 from that of the highest modern human beings. 



Weak though such claims may be considered, they cannot be ignored. If admitted, 

 they have the effect (in the present connection) of relegating the time of what may be 

 termed the active evolution of the higher type of mankind, to a period so remote as to 

 be almost incredible. Advocates of the greater antiquity of the higher types .of man 

 incline to regard Homo primigenius as a lingering representative of his kind. They do 

 not agree as to his ultimate fate, i.e. whether the type died out, or, on the contrary, 

 entered into a composite form which is represented in modern populations. Professor 

 Klaatsch in particular holds that the primitive race was subjected to an invasion by 

 representatives of higher type, and that the man of Aurignac provides a representative 

 of the latter. Upon such assumptions, a far-reaching theory of the collateral develop- 

 ment of two human stocks has been erected. A contrast of the Homo primigenius 

 (of " African " affinities and origin) with the H. aurignacensis (of " Asiatic " relations) 

 was instituted first (1909) on the examination of the fossil remains in each case respec- 

 tively. Undismayed by the general disapproval with which this view was received, its 

 author did not hesitate. 1 He extended the contrast to the existing races of man, and 

 from the bones of the skeleton to the brain (1911). It will be interesting to learn 

 whether the later extension can survive the crushing rejoinder which it has just elicited 

 from an expert in cerebral anatomy (1912). 



But the fate of such theories is after all of subsidiary interest. The evidence 

 remains for what it is worth, and the essential evidence here in question is that on 

 which are based claims of the modern type of human skeleton to great antiquity. 

 For eighty years past, since Schmerling unearthed the celebrated Engis skull, records 

 will be found of the renewals of discoveries of highly evolved human remains in sus- 

 picious association with animals now extinct, or at least unknown in European sur- 

 roundings or a climate corresponding thereto. Nor are the records confined to caves, 

 for many examples occur in widespread deposits considered on other grounds to have 

 been laid down before the advent of the earliest human beings. In England, the 

 specimen known as the Galley Hill skeleton furnishes a good example of this class of 

 case, but suspicion has not yet been finally allayed concerning the exact circumstances 

 of its discovery. A much more recent instance, viz. the skeleton found in 1911 near 

 Ipswich, 2 deserves very special mention. The bones in question were found beneath 

 a stratum of boulder clay, and in fact at the horizon where this stratum overlies the 

 so-called middle glacial sand deposit of the locality. The skeleton does riot differ in 

 essentials (with one exception, which does not however approximate it to any other 

 known human type) from the most recent human forms. If it was deposited in situ 

 before the advent of the boulder clay, the specimen establishes the existence of a 



1 Klaatsch, Korrespondenzblatt der Deutschen Gesellschaft fur Anthropologie, Ethnologic 

 und Urgeschichte, in the Archiv fur Anthropologie, 1911, s. 84. 



2 Prehistoric Society of East Anglia, Annual Report, 1912. 



