258 



PROF. J. C. EWART ON 



The Urus was widely distributed in Britain in Neolithic times, 

 but the examination of Roman and Roman-British stations has 

 hitherto afforded no evidence that Bos pri7nigenius still survived 

 in England at the Roman invasion. 



A number of more or less complete skulls of the Urus have 

 been found in Scotland, and fragments of skulls, limb-bones, or 

 horn-cores believed to belong to the Urus have been found 

 in almost every county in Scotland between the Solway and the 

 Pentland Firths, and some horn-cores found in Orkney are so 

 large that it is assumed they belong to Bos jJ^nigenius. 



Text-fig. 71. 



Front part of skull of a polled Aberdeen-Angus Ox, with premaxillffi {P.3£.) extending 

 nearly as far up between tbe maxilla {Mx.) and nasals (Na.) as in the Buffalo 

 (text-fig. 64, p. 251). From a specimen in the Royal Scottish Museum. 



Though there is no evidence that the Urus survived long 

 enough in England to give rise to the Chillingham and other 

 " wild" white park cattle, it has been suggested that a sufficient 

 number survived in the Caledonian forests to found the Oadzow, 

 Atholl, or other Scottish herds of " wild " cattle. The bones from 

 Newstead, however, afford no evidence that the Urus still survived 

 in Scotland when the Romans constructed the border-fort during 

 the later part of the first century a.d. 



The skull of Bos taurus jjrimigenms is in some respects more 

 highly specialized than that of any other member of the Bovidse. 

 Hitherto in studying bovine skulls a A^ery considerable amount of 

 attention has visually been directed to the position, size, and 



