THE GIANT DEER. 3 



Mantell, writing in 1851 (35), had no doubt as to its contemporaneity with Man, and 

 even suggested that it was exterminated by the Celtic tribes. 



Several important contributions by Owen belong to this period. In his ' Report 

 on the British Fossil Mammals ' (26), presented at the Cork meeting of the British 

 Association in 1843, a comparison is made of the antlers of the Irish Giant Deer, 

 Fallow Deer and Elk. In 1846, in his ' British Fossil Mammals and Birds ' (30), 

 Owen gave by far the fullest account of the Giant Deer which had hitherto been 

 published, and in 1848, in a paper (33) describing remains from Essex, he produced 

 evidence of its contemporaneity with the extinct Pleistocene mammals — a fact which 

 had been called in question by Richardson. The output of papers by Irish writers 

 continued, Oldham (1849) (34) describing bones from Kiltiernan, and W. R. Wilde 

 (1859) (42) mentioning the existence of sixteen crania in the Academy collection at 

 Dublin. 



In 1859 appeared H. Denny's important paper (40) entitled "On the Claims of 

 the Gigantic Irish Deer to be considered as Contemporary with Man." In this paper 

 many interesting points are considered, including the distribution of the Irish Deer 

 in the British Isles and elsewhere, the reason for the remarkable assemblages of 

 individuals within certain limited areas, and the causes of its extinction. 



A number of British records belong to the next few years. Thus, in 1859, J. 

 McEnery (41) recorded Megaceros from Kent's Cavern, Torquay, and in 1861 R. 

 Howse (43) described an imperfect skeleton from South Shields and a pair of antlers 

 found after a storm at the mouth of the Tees. N. Moore (1867) (50) recorded Megaceros 

 from the Cambridgeshire Fens. Dawkins, in his classical paper " On the Distribution 

 of British Post-Glacial Mammals " (1869) (52), recorded it from nine caves and eight 

 river deposits in England and Wales. G. Busk (1875) (58) described the remains of 

 several individuals from a bone-cave at Creswell Crags, Derbyshire. 



The question as to the contemporaneity of Megaceros with Man is alluded to by 

 J. B. Jukes (1864) (46) in a paper " On Some Indentations on Bones of a Cervus 

 megaceros found . . . near Legan, co. Longford." 



Papers by R. J. Moss (1876) (61) and G. Porte (1877) (62) refer to the remarkable 

 discovery of Megaceros remains at Ballybetagh, co. Dublin, where the bones of a 

 hundred animals were found. Many of these are now in the National Museum of 

 Ireland. Porte lays stress on the erroneous character of the idea still prevalent, that 

 the skeletons occur in bogs, and brings forward some fresh suggestions as to the cause 

 of the destruction of so many of these animals, and of the great preponderance of the 

 male. 



In 1878 appeared the first of a series of papers by Leith Adams referring to the 

 Giant Deer. Many of the points on which he lays stress are discussed in the sequel. 

 General accounts of the known facts relating to the Irish Giant Deer are given by 

 G. H. Kinahan (1883) (79) and V. Ball (1885) (81), and both allude to the finding of 

 bones in association with flint implements at Ballynamintra, co. Waterford. Ball 



