Reports & Proceedings — Geological Society of London. 227 



Dr. Henry Woodward, Mr. Robert S. Herries, and Dr. A. Smith 

 "Woodward were re-elected President, Treasurer, and Secretary 

 respectively. 



In a brief address, the President referred to the fact that when the 

 Society was founded it was anticipated that all the British fossils 

 could be described and figured in about twenty-five years, whereas 

 the long series of fine volumes published during seventy years had 

 only made a good beginning of the task. 



II. — Geological Society of London. 



1. February 28, 1917.— Dr. Alfred BZarker, F.R.S., President, in 



the Chair. 



The following communication was read : — 



"Fourth Note on the Piltdown Gravel, with Evidence of a Second 

 Skull of Eocinthropus dawsoni." By Arthur Smith Woodward, LL.D., 

 F.R.S., Y.P.G.S. With an Appendix on the Form of the Frontal 

 Pole of an Endocranial Cast of Eoanthropus daiosoni. By Professor 

 Grafton Elliot Smith, M.A., M.D., F.R.S. 



Excavations last summer round the margin of the gravel-pit at 

 Piltdown (Sussex) supported the conclusion that the deposit is a 

 varied shingle-bank, and that the three layers containing Palaeolithic 

 remains and derived Pliocene fossils are approximately of the same 

 age. Many elongated flints and pieces of Wealden sandstone were 

 observed in the bottom sandy clay with their long axis more or less 

 nearly vertical. No teeth or bones were found, but one nodular flint 

 obtained from the same layer as Eoanthropus seems to have been 

 used by man as a hammer-stone. This is not purposely shaped, but 

 merely battered along faces that happened to be useful when the 

 stone was conveniently held in the hand. 



In the winter of 1915 the late Mr. Charles Dawson discovered in 

 a ploughed field, about a mile distant from the original spot, the 

 inner supraorbital part of a frontal bone, the middle of an occipital 

 bone, and a left lower first molar tooth, all evidently human. These 

 are rolled fragments, and the first and third may be referred with 

 certainty to Eoanthropus dawsoni ; but it is doubtful whether they 

 represent more than one individual. In mineralized condition they 

 agree with the remains of the type-specimen. The piece of frontal 

 bone exhibits the characteristic texture and thickness, with only 

 a very slight supraciliary ridge, and a small development of air- 

 sinuses. The occipital bone is somewhat less thickened than that of 

 the original specimen of Eoanthropus, and bears the impression of 

 a less unsymmetrical brain. The external occipital protuberance is 

 a little above the upper limit of the cerebellum, as in Neanderthal 

 man; thus differing from the condition both in Eoanthropus and in 

 modern man. The lower molar is exactly similar to the first lower 

 molar of Eoanthropus already described, but is more obliquely worn 

 by mastication. Detailed comparison shows that this tooth is human, 

 differing essentially from that of a chimpanzee in its more hypsodont 

 crown, thicker enamel, and less prominence of the neck over the root. 



