NORFOLK PREHISTORY 61 
though occasionally specimens occur with unusually thick cortex. The 
characteristic staining, usually underlain by a definitely thick layer of 
pure white, renders recognition easy, even in the case of surface finds. 
The main tints are black-lead or purple black, passing through purple 
to pale lavender, or through deep mahogany to orange-brown or 
yellowish, and these contrast strongly on freshly fractured surfaces with 
the white patinated layer and the unchanged flint beneath. The intense 
patination suggests prolonged exposure on a former land surface, but 
the final tint of the staining seems to depend to some extent on the con- 
ditions of oxidation or reduction of the local portion of the deposit itself. 
At Harford Bridges the flints were of a lavender tint, at Thorpe mostly 
black, though a given patch might show all the contained flints brown or 
purple ; on the West Runton foreshore browns prevail below and blacks 
above. 
The first stone bed artifacts were found by the late W. G. Clarke in 
1905, but the establishment of the fact of human industries is entirely 
the result of twenty years’ unremitting research by Reid Moir. The 
bitter controversies have now died down; the arguments formerly 
advanced against the human workmanship of the specimens—the appeal 
to ‘natural causes,’ pressure of the superincumbent strata, earth creep, 
the flaking effects of moving ice, wave action, and ‘ chip-and-slide ’—are 
no longer met with, and the time is ripe for the further investigation based 
on design, technique and condition of surface, towards differentiating 
between the pre-Crag industries; for in the formation of the stone bed 
all specimens, of whatever age, were swept into one deposit. ‘This task 
has already been begun by Reid Moir. 
Whilst the Suffolk ‘ bone bed’ contains a fairly high proportion of 
rostro-carinate types, these are by no means so well represented in the 
Norfolk Stone Bed, and are outnumbered by flake implements, some of 
which are of surprisingly advanced type. The great mass of the specimens 
are certainly pre-Chellian, but the occasional hand-axes, particularly the 
boldly flaked and skilfully designed specimen from Whitlingham 
(Norwich Castle Museum),* suggest that Early Chellian is at hand. The 
chief sites now available are Eaton, Whitlingham, the cliff section from 
Weybourne to Sheringham, and beach exposures at Beeston and West 
Runton. Amongst the specimens which call for special notice are * The 
Norwich Test Specimen ’ rostro-carinate (British Museum),° described 
by Sir Ray Lankester, and the huge flake, 6 lb. 6 oz. (British Museum),® 
both from Whitlingham ; the fine scraper (Norwich Castle Museum) 
from Thorpe ; the ‘ giant hand-axe’ from Beeston,’ and a series from 
the coast sections which will be exhibited at the meetings. The 
conditions of formation of the stone bed have militated against the 
preservation of human skeletal remains. The striae and chattermarks 
present on many of the flaked specimens appear to be due to moving 
ice, but no information is at present available concerning any tertiary 
glaciations. 
Se PIPS-E. A. 1)1, pa4o: 4 P.P.S.E.A., VI, iii, pp. 222-225. 
5 Royal Anthropological Institute Occasional Papers, No. 4 (1914). 
SP PUPS. EVA. Nib, i, ps67. 7 P.P.S.E.A., VI, iii, pp. 222-225. 
