A STUDY OF PREHISTORIC ANTHROPOLOGY. 611 



lu seeking to establish the existence of a j^aleolithic period in 

 America, it has been objected that many of the implements introduced 

 as evidence were found on the surface. In western Europe surface 

 finds are not at all uncommon. The St. Germain Museum, at Paris, ex- 

 hibits six cases of Ohellian implements. In five of them are displayed 

 those from the river gravels, and in one is shown similar implements 

 from the surface. These are distinguished as being from the plateau. 

 (The plateau in this case meaning the surface of high level unaffected 

 by the wash of the water which formed the river.) Mr. Solomon 

 Eeinach, curator of that museum, in his catalogue and ^^Description 

 Baisonnee,^' says, page 84 : 



The implements found in the ancient alluvium of the rivera are those which have 

 been used or have been rejected. Sometimes they are water- worn, sometimes alto- 

 gether new and even unfinished. * * * Xho implements gathered on the i)lateau 

 come from the camps or workshops. They are much less interesting than those of 

 the alluvium, not being accompanied by a fauna which can serve for their chrono- 

 logic classification. * * * As the soil of the plateaus is continually upturned 

 by its cultivation, which has thrown together in the same layers the remains of suc- 

 cessive civilizations, so the paleolithic and neolithic instruments are often found 

 on or near the surface mixed with those of the epoch of metal and of modern times. 



The plateaux on the surface of which these .Chellian implements were 

 found extends largely over the interior of France. 



Dr. John Evans, the celebrated prehistoric archaeologist of England, 

 and the author of "Ancient Stone Implements of Great Britain," says 

 in that work (page 531), " Not far from Currie Farm I found on the 

 surface of the ground, in 1869, a well-marked paleolithic implement, in 

 character and size resembling that of Stud-Hill (Fig, 462), and stained 

 a rich ochreous color." During a visit to Dr. Evans's collection in 1889 

 the writer saw thirty or more paleolithic implements which had been 

 found on the surface in the neighborhood of Ightham, Kent. Mr. B. 

 Harrison has gathered in the same neighborhood nigh six hundred 

 paleolithic implements which are described by Mr. Prestwich in the 

 Quarterly Geologic Journal, Ko. 178, of May 1, 1889. I quite agree 

 with Mr. Eeinach that these surface implements are much less inter- 

 esting than those found in the river gravels. I agree and have 

 always said that the implements thus found are not proof of the 

 antiquity of the paleolithic period. The most I have ever contended 

 was that they were evidence of its existence. The paleolithic imple- 

 ments of Europe have been found by the ten thousand in the river 

 gravels at various depths, and associated with the extinct fauna 

 of the Quaternary geologic period. Thus the antiquity of the paleo- 

 lithic period has been established without the aid of the implements 

 found upon the surface. In the United States this is not the case; there- 

 fore the discovery of the paleolithic implements on the surface have a 

 greater relative importance than in Europe. They, however, are evi- 

 dence only of the existence and not of its antiquity of a paleolithic 

 period. The antiquity remains to be solved by other means. 



