1866.] Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. 233 



miles, is but a small portion of the tract over which these chipped 

 agates will ultimately be met with. Cores of the prismatic form, 

 chipped from chert, have been found in Sind, and specimens are pre- 

 served in the collection of the Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic 

 Society. 



" The question of the geological age of these implements becomes 

 of great importance, when we consider the neighbourhood of the 

 locality in which they occur, to the most important later tertiary 

 deposit containing remains of mammalia, which has yet been explored 

 in India, — the Pliocene gravels of the Nerbudda. It is to be hoped 

 that it may be possible to trace the connection of the bone-bearing 

 beds with those containing the implements. In connection with this 

 question, the discovery of a flake by Mr. Wynne of the Geological 

 Survey in situ, in the gravels of the Upper Godavery, already men- 

 tioned to the Society by Dr. Oldham, (see Proceedings for December, 

 1865, p. 207,) is of remarkable interest. A note of the discovery has 

 also been published by Mr. Wynne in the Geological Magazine. I 

 was myself at first very sceptical as to the genuineness of this flake, 

 but a recent re-examination, and comparison of it with some of the 

 Jubbulpoor specimens, have strongly inclined me to believe that it is 

 really of human manufacture. It is precisely similar in form to one 

 Jubbulpoor flake (PI TV., fig. 11), differing onjy in its larger size. 



u It should never be forgotten that the question of the antiquity of 

 .man in India has a peculiar interest. Both tradition and scientific in- 

 duction point to the tropics and especially to tropical Asia as the 

 cradle of the human race. If this occurrence of implements of human 

 manufacture in the Godavery gravels be confirmed, and especially if 

 similar implements be found in the Nerbudda beds, they will prove 

 man in India to have been contemporaneous with a fauna differing far 

 more widely from that existing at the present day, than did the old 

 cave fauna from that of modern Europe. 



" Another point of interest is, the relative antiquity of the agate 

 cores and flakes of the Nerbudda to the quartzite axes, scrapers and 

 sling stones of Madras. Judging from the European equivalents, the 

 Madras specimens should be the older : they exactly resemble the im- 

 plements of the Amiens and Sussex gravels, whilst the counterparts of 

 the Jubbulpoor flakes are to be found in the cave shelters of Dordogne, 

 the shell mounds of Denmark, and the tumuli and barrows of England. 



