COLUMBIAN HISTORICAL EXPOSITION AT MADRID. 



99 



UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



EVIDENCES OF THE EXTREME ANTIQUITY OF MAN. 



The existence of man on the American continent during a stage of culture corre 

 sponding to the Paleolithic period in Europe has been the subject of much dispute 

 among American anthropologists and geologists. The investigations in this respect 

 in the United States of America have not been so profound as in Europe, and anthro 

 pologists are not unanimous concerning the conclusions to be drawn therefrom. The 

 contemporaneity of the periods in the two hemispheres has not been universally 

 accepted, nor has the relationship of the men who made or used the implements been 

 established. 

 Implements similar in form, style, and manufacture to those of the Paleolithic age 



from European countries have been found in the United States, which, if found 



in Europe, would be accepted as belonging to that age. These have been found 



by the hundred in every section of 



the United States on the surface and 



at varying depths in the gravels of 



several rivers, and in the Pleistocene 



deposits. Flint, argillite, andquart- 



zite were the materials mostly used. 



The implements are rude and thick 



and always chipped. Twenty-one 



implements from every part of the 



United States are shown. 

 Fossil human thorax. Seven vertebra 



with corresponding ribs and ster 

 num, from Osprey, Sarasota Bay, 



Manatee County, Fla. The bones 



are fossilized. They were found on 



the seashore incased in indurated 



ferruginous sandstone. The two 



pieces of stone belong together and 



form one subject ; they were broken 



in extraction. The sandstone was 



overlaid by surface deposits 1| to 3 



feet. Geologists assign it to the 



Quaternary period. Found by 



Judge John G. Webb. 

 Fossilized human skull, turned to iron. From Osprey, Manatee County, Fla. Found 



in 1868 at a depth of 2 or 3 feet in the undisturbed subsoil in proximity to a 



shell heap. The skull was accidentally broken at its discovery. The skeleton 



was in place. The bones were sent forward, but some of them were lost. Part 



of them are now in the Peabody Museum. The skull and other bones were 



turned to limouite (hydrous sesquioxide of iron) by process of fossilization. 



The measurements of the skull are : Glabella to occipital protuberance, 170 mm. ; 



breadth above the auditory meatuses, 131 mm.; breadth of the forehead at tem 

 poral ridges, 102 mm. Found by Judge John G. Webb. 

 Fossilized human thigh bone, changed to iron. A piece of limonite (hydrous ses- 



quioxide of iron) containing a portion of a human thigh bone which has itself 



been changed to limonite. From Sarasota Bay, Florida. Collected by Col. Joseph 



Wilcox, of Philadelphia. 

 .Rock formation from Sarasota Bay, Florida, containing fossilized shell of (1) Venus, 



(2*) Pecten, (3) Fasciolaria tulipa, and others overlying the limouite formation 



containing the human remains from the same locality. These shells belong to 



the Quaternary Geologic period as well as to the recent. Collected by Col. 



Joseph Wilcox, of Philadelphia- 



Fig. 11. 



Fig. 12. 



POLISHED STONE HATCHETS OF FLINT. 



Showing process of inanufiicture, Kurope (after Mortillet). 



