56 CRETE 



i 



topped hill noted for the quantity of bones found in 

 an Osseous breccia and in Ossiferous fissures. It was 

 visited early in the century and briefly described by 

 Spallanzani, and notwithstanding the evident interest 

 of the place it does not appear to have been examined 

 by any geologists since that time. He described the 

 bones in the fissures as generally much broken and 

 few entire and embedded in a reddish earth solidified. 

 It was said by Cuvier closely to resemble the breccia 

 of Nice. 1 



No description of the bones is given, but amongst 

 them Spallanzani reports that the doctor of the island 

 recognised a human jaw with its teeth and a portion 

 of the skull with its sutures. Cuvier doubted the 

 account, but without seeing the specimens, and it must 

 be remembered that at that time it was the conviction 

 both of geologists and naturalists that Man was of 

 recent creation and had not existed at the same time as 

 the great extinct Mammalia. The isolated position of 

 the hill would, like those of Nice and Cette, cause its 

 summit to be sought as a place of refuge from the 

 rising waters, whether by the wild animals or by 

 early Man. 



Crete. Not only are there in this island several 

 raised beaches of Quaternary age, one of which is sixty- 

 five feet above the sea level, but there is evidence 

 that the movements of the ground have been con- 

 tinued down to recent times, for the west side of the 

 island has been raised twenty-six feet within the 

 historical period, whilst the east coast has subsided to 



1 See Les Qsseimnis Fossiles, vol. iv., p. 213, Paris, 1823. 



