237 
chronology for the period preceding the First Mayan Finpire, which 
opens its time count in H.C\ The case is different in northern 
Europe, for there clay varvcs have given us a tlefinite time scale into 
which we can fit certain i)hysiographic, climatic, botanical, and cul- 
tural changes; in America geologists have not yet succeeded in tieing 
together the various varve counts into a consecutive series. Some 
scientists have tried to obtain a time count by other methods. Thus 
Sim toniple at Cliitzen It/.a, sliowinj;: tlic liijrli developmont of avchitortuie ainonfi the 
Maya Tiidiaiis of Central America. (l*hntn hi/ cniiytenij of r<nhoihj Miifteiini, 
Tf anard U ii h'crHity.) 
Allison counted the number of light and dark bands on a stalagmite 
overlying charcoal and an engraved mastodon bone in a limestone 
cavern near Pineville, Missouri, and calculated that the cavern had 
been inhabited from about 16,080 B.C. to 11.730 B.C.^ His assump- 
tion, however, that these light and dark bands represent annual 
layers is generally discredited, and his deductions meet with no sup- 
1 Allison, Vernon C. ; “The .\nliqiiitv of the Deposits in Jacob’s Cavern’’; Anth. Papers, Am, Mus. 
Xat. vol. xix, pp. 297-335 (New York, 1926). 
