THE PROBLEM OF ANTIQUITY OF MAN IN AUSTRALIA 33 
differ from the Aitape fragment little more than do average 
Australian skulls. There are no characters suggesting affinities 
with Tasmanians; the absence of the paramedian parietal groove, 
stressed by Wunderly as characteristic of Tasmanians, and the 
fairly obvious narrowness of the parietal region definitely exclud- 
ing this possibility. 
The skull is in the Australian Institute of Anatomy, Canberra. 
Other Fossil Human Remains 
Basedow (1925) mentioned the fossilized posterior half of 
the left parietal of a human skull found in ‘Pleistocene (or 
Pliocene?)’’ gravels SSE. of Tennant’s Creek district, Central 
Australia. He gives no exact locality, no indication of how the 
age of the deposit was determined, nor at what depth the specimen 
was found, nor who discovered it. I can find no record of where 
the specimen now is. H. M. Hale and N. B. Tindale, of the South 
Australian Museum, have informed me that they handled the 
specimen some years ago, and that Basedow then told them that 
it had been found on the surface; it was stained brown but not 
mineralized, and in their opinion it did not suggest geological 
antiquity. After Basedow’s death they prepared his collections 
for submission to the Institute of Anatomy, Canberra, which 
afterwards purchased them, but the specimen was not then recog- 
nized among his effects. 
The Melbourne Argus of December 6th, 1915, published the 
following note: 
“While digging out marl at Jimmy’s Point, Lakes Entrance, a labourer recently 
unearthed three human skulls, evidently of very primitive type. They were near 
the base of the escarpment, and about ten feet from the grassed surface. Each of 
them was in a remarkably good state of preservation. Professor Flynn from 
Tasmania, who was making an official tour of inquiry at the Lakes with the Chief 
Inspector of Fisheries, Victoria, examined the skulls, and said he would report 
to the Melbourne University, and that they were of great archaeological interest.” 
I have been unable to find what became of these skulls; they are 
not at the Melbourne University. 
Under favourable conditions, such as contact with water 
carrying carbonates in solution, organic matter may be rapidly 
mineralized. There are certain springs in which twigs, ete., become 
coated and impregnated with carbonate of lime in a few weeks. 
Mineralization of human bones cannot therefore be taken as proof 
of geological antiquity; the age of the deposit in which the bones 
are found and evidence that they are contemporaneous with it, 
not subsequent burials, are the only acceptable proofs of geological 
antiquity. 
