1862.] 



149 



VII. " On the Distorted Skulls found at Wroxeter (Salop), with a 

 Mechanico-Chemical Explanation of the Distortion." By 

 HENRY JOHNSON, M.D., Shrewsbury. Communicated by 

 ERASMUS WILSON, Esq. Received June 19, 1862. 

 (Abstract.) 



The author states that about twenty crania were brought from the 

 excavations at Wroxeter. Of these, two were discovered at the 

 bottom of a hypocaust, seven feet below the surface of the earth. 

 Of the remaining nineteen, which were dug up in the Orchard 

 some distance from the other excavation, nearly one -half, that is 

 nine, were more or less deformed. As the deformed skulls were 

 found lying under less than two feet of light earth, whilst those 

 which were buried under, and pressed by, seven feet of rubble or 

 heavy earth were not deformed, he thinks that the pressure theory 

 alone will not satisfactorily account for the phenomena. The idea 

 occurred to him that some chemical agency was at work in the former 

 case which did not operate in the latter. He ascertained by experi- 

 ment that the soil of the Orchard was acid, reddening litmus, whilst 

 that of the hypocausts was neutral or alkaline. 



The author goes on to show that the acidity of the soil of the 

 Orchard, and of vegetable mould in general, is due to the presence 

 of free carbonic and nitric acids, which are not to be detected in 

 earth taken from some depth, such as that of the hypocaust or a 

 deep pit. That carbonic acid is capable of dissolving bone (that is, 

 carbonate and phosphate of lime) is abundantly proved by more than 

 one experiment. A dried and weighed slip of bone was introduced 

 into a bottle with distilled water highly charged with carbonic acid 

 gas. In a month's time it had decidedly lost weight and become 

 somewhat flexible. 



The author's first impression was that humic acid was the solvent 

 of bone in the earth. He believes that traces of alkaline humates 

 may always be discovered, in ''the washings" of soil, but that this 

 fact has nothing to do with the solution of buried bones, and there- 

 fore he does not pursue the subject. 



The author draws, therefore, the following conclusions : 



1 . That the distortion of the skulls found at Wroxeter is not con" 

 genital, but posthumous, 



VOL. XII. M 



