256 PROF. J. C. EWART ON 



modern loose and sliort-horned or hornless cattle. There is, 

 therefore, no reason for rejecting the assumption or hypothesis 

 that the Ox of Anau, which about 7000 B.C. was undergoing 

 this change of form, finally reached Central Europe, after its 

 migration through Southern Russia and Eastern Europe, in the 

 stunted form of Bos taurus hrachyceros" * i. e. in the small Celtic 

 Shoi'thorn generally known in England as Bos longifrons. 



If the conclvisions ai-rived at by Duerst and others are justified, 

 it follows (1) that all the modern domestic cattle — the humped 

 breeds of India and Africa as well as the European breeds — are 

 derived either from the Urus of Europe (^Bos taui'us 2}i'i'niigenius) 

 or its reputed near relative the Urus of Asia {Bos namadicios), or 

 are a blend of varieties or races of these two species ; and (2) that 

 modern British breeds have been formed by crossing the Celtic 

 .Shorthorn (Bos longifrons vel hrachyceros) — the small domesti- 

 cated i-ace widely distributed over Britain in pre-Roman times — 

 with Continental breeds (including shoi't-horned as well as long- 

 horned varieties) introduced since the Roman invasion. Are these 

 conclusions supported by the remains of cattle from the border- 

 foi't occupied by Roman auxiliaries during the first and second 

 centuries of the present ei'a ? 



Prof. Boule, in his recent work on the Grimaldi fossils, says the 

 genus Bos (which includes the most specialized members of the 

 Bovid family) seems to have been represented in Pliocene times 

 by Bos planifrons and Bos acutifrons of the Siwalik deposits of 

 India. Duei'st regards Bos planifrons t as the ancestor of both 

 Bos priraigenius and Bos namadicus, but Riitimeyer thinks that 

 though Bos p>lcinifrons may be ancestral to, it is only a variety of 

 Bos primigenius, the European variety of Bos ncmnadicics. 



Though Bos p7'imigenius, like the Bison, only reached Europe 

 in Quaternary times, it was soon widely distributed- — its 

 remains occur in English Pleistocene deposits containing ElepJias 

 antiquus and in deposits of a like age over the greater part of 

 Eui'ope and also in North Africa. While Bos primigenms was 

 extending its range over Eui'ope, Bos namadicus was spreading 

 over Asia. 



It has hitherto been supposed that the Bison was more abun- 

 dant in Europe during Pleistocene times than the Urus, bvit 

 Prof. Boule believes that, at least in the vicinity of Grimaldi, the 

 Urus was from the first as common as the Bison. 



About the colour of the Urus nothing absolutely certain is 

 known, but from drawings of Mediaeval, as well as Palaeolithic 

 ai'tists we can form a fairly accurate conception of its conformation. 

 A picture, believed to have been made in Bavaria about 1500 a.d,, 

 probably brings out the chief points of Bos 2>'>^i')nigeniibs %. 



* Duerst, op. cit. p. 440. 



t According to Duerst's latest view there is no real difference between Bos 'plant- 

 fi'ons of Riitimej^er and JBos acutifrons of Lydekker, but at one time he believed 

 Bos acutifrons was the predecessor of Bos namadicus, to which the Bibovine (Gaur 

 and Banting) group and especially the Indian Zebu were related. 



J This picture is reproduced in the ' Oyclopffidia of American Agriculture,' vol. iii. 

 1900 ; the Urus apparently survived in Poland up to 1627. 



