58 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [bill. 00 



ments of humanity. Shall we then be able to predicate great an- 

 tiquity for the occupation of the American Continent on the testi- 

 mony furnished by the achievements of human labor or even on the 

 length of time required for the evolution of the American cultures 

 from the neolithic elements assumed to have been introduced from 

 Asia ? 

 As tlius presented, the testimony of racial and cultural phenomena 

 dissociated from geological criteria does not serve 

 Gooiosicai chro- ^^^ indicate clearly an antiquitv for the aboriginal 



nology "^ 1 . to 



occupancy beyond a few thousand years. Through 

 association with geological formations, the age of which can be 

 determined with some degree of accuracy, both cultural and 

 somatic remains combine to extend our vision with reasonable clear- 

 ness well back toward the close of the last glacial occupation of 

 middle North America, a j)eriod whose duration is estimated by some 

 students at from eight to twenty thousand years. Some students 

 of the subject are satisfied that authentic evidence of man's presence 

 during the glacial period has been obtained, others find sufficient 

 reasons for believing in man's existence in both North and South 

 America far back in Tertiary times, while a single bold advocate of 

 autochthonic antiquity has promidgated the view" that man origi- 

 nated in the western world ratlier than in the eastern and proceeds 

 to identify his forbears among the American lower orders. 



The geological evidence of antiquity, derived from the association 

 of somatic and cultural remains with geological formations, that 

 is to say, such formations, beds, layers, or strata as are due to 

 natural as distinguished from artificial deposition, is extensive, and 

 a full and exhaustive discussion of the subject necessarily involves 

 the consideration of a vast body of testimony which, however, can 

 not be more than briefly summarized in this place. The evidence w411 

 be presented, therefore, in outline merely, and the literature of origi- 

 nal research will be cited somewhat fully for the benefit of those 

 who may wish to pursue the subject further. 



The various discoveries reported may be taken up somewhat in 



chronologic order, beginning with the earliest assigned date. First 



consideration thus falls to the testimony furnished 



South Amorican )jy gtudents of South American chronology, especially 



TcstiiiKjiiy ■■ . . . to.' 7 1 J 



Ameghino and his associates, who have accmnulated 

 a large body of data purporting to indicate the presence of man in 

 the pampas region of South America in remote times, the earliest 

 traces brought forward being accumulations of cinders associated 

 wath strata assigned to the Eocene age and assumed to be due to 

 human agency. The several periods intervening between the early 

 Tertiary and historic times have been bridged by Ameghino by 



