CORRESPONDENCE. 
415 
CORRESPONDENCE. 
To the Editor of the Geologist. 
Sir, — When a subject of so much importance as the antiquity of the human race 
is being discussed, there is a liability to the production of fallacious facts, as well 
as the possibility of " true facts" being pressed beyond their legitimate value. 
A correspondent has furnished you with some particulars concerning the disco- 
very of a human skull in the valley of the Trent, near Newark — a very different 
locahty from the vale of Belvoir. 
I am of opinion that some caution is necessaiy before this discovery can be taken 
in evidence upon the subject in support of which it is brought forward. There are 
facts associated with the locality which, I conceive, do not support the apparent 
testimony — that the skull in question belonged to an individual who lived in the age 
of animals now extinct. The position in which it was discovered — so near to the 
river Trent — would give a degree of suspicion to its being a genuine witness ; besides, 
its being so near to a bend in the river would make its value additionally question- 
able. The horns of deer, and bones of extinct animals, with which it was found, do 
not supply a suflBcient reason in this particular instance for its being produced in 
evidence of a high antiquity. 
Any one who is familiar with the geological phenomena of the Trent Valle 
would regard with considerable doubt the claims which this skull should have in 
bearing testimony upon so important a question, because an apparently undisturbed 
condition of the drift could not be relied upon as a safe criterion by which to judge 
of the antiquity of its animal remains, in localities near to the present channel of 
the river. The Trent, in various parts of the valley, is ever changing its course, 
especially at the curves. In the course of a few centuries, therefore, it is possible 
the stream might deviate considerably from its original channel. This fact has been 
observed in several instances. In one example, a few miles from the place at which 
the remains alluded to were discovered, the gradual erosion of the land from one 
side at a bend in the river, and an equivalent deposition on the opposite margin, 
has continued until several acres have been transferred from one side of the river to 
the other, within the memory of living individuals. The river, moreover, does not 
continue at the same depth at any particular place ; places which were once 
fordable are now too deep to pass over, and vice versd. 
If human remains were discovered at a depth of twenty- five feet in these drift 
gravels, over which it was known the river had passed in recent times, it is certain 
they could not supply any satisfactory evidence of a high antiquity. 
The diagram at p. 351 represents the locality of the discovery. The sharpness of 
the curve in the river would undoubtedly in a few centuries cause the stream at 
this place to deviate more or less from its original course. This skull may, there- 
fore, have been in the first instance at the bottom of the river with the bones of 
animals and horns of deer washed out from the drift gravels, and as the stream 
gradually removed from the channel in which it then flowed, they would be covered 
by its deposits. In course of time the river would have removed to a distance from 
its former bed in which the remains were found. 
The association of pottery with the other relics in so limited a space as fifteen 
feet would seem to indicate a depression in the bed of the river, into which they 
would be collected by the current. 
The river's deposition of sand and silt would also assume that natural form which 
would have the appearance of an undisturbed stratification, because it had been 
formed by natural causes. 
If those who have inspected the locality have fully estimated these facts, it may 
be the discovery is as valuable as your correspondent appears to consider it. 
I am, dear Sir, yours respectfully, 
Nottingham, \Zth Sept., 1861. 
J. H. W. 
