186 



BUEEAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY 



[bill. 



The illustrations given by Gervais show nine teeth, all of very 

 ordinary form and size, and all somewhat worn (fig. 43), and four stone 

 implements, more or less identical in form with quartzite implements 

 from the Argentine coast (see section on Archeology). 



F. P. Moreno, one of the most experienced of the Argentine men of 

 science, referring in 1874 to the alleged finds of the remains of ancient 

 man in Argentina before that time, voices his doubts much more freely : 



' ' In the soil of the Province of Buenos Aires, above all in the banks 

 of its numerous arroyos and lakes, there are discovered from time to 

 time vestiges which indicate the existence of indigenous man anterior 

 to the Conquest. 



"These vestiges, which represent fragments of domestic objects and 

 some weapons, belong undoubtedly to the epoch of modern alluvia. 



Fig. 43.— Teeth from the Carcarafia skull. (After GcrvaLs.) 



Various authors have believed, nevertheless, that the}' should be 

 assigned to an age contemporaneous wdth that of the great extinct 

 American mammals; but the existence of Quaternary man in the 

 Argentine territory is not yet certainly proven. 



"The discoveries which have been made in the Pampean strata 

 during the last years are isolated and the human remains obtained 

 have been brought to light by persons who are strangers to paleon- 

 tology and little prepared for dealing with the problems of tlie 

 j)ampas, and although these persons assure us that the remains were 

 fountl mingled with tlic bones of the glyptodons and mylodons, we are 

 not justified in attaching much importance to this circumstance. 



