232 THE ANTIQUITY OF MAN 
Pliocene gravels of St Prest, containing remains of a Pli- 
ocene elephant (Elephas meridionalis)^ that M. Desnoyers^ 
found, in 1863, the bones of extinct animals showing 
clear signs of having been cut or hacked by man 
(see p. 313). Four years later, M. Bourgeois found in 
the same Pliocene gravels, flint implements representing 
the last of the Pliocene cultures — to which M. Rutot 
has given the name " St Prestien." Over the PHocene 
strata at St Prest, M. Rutot recognises the usual 
Pleistocene deposits of the 100-foot terrace — particularly 
the " glaise moseen " (fig. 80). It is at the horizon 
represented by the junction of the Pliocene and the 
Pleistocene deposit of the 100-foot terrace that M. Rutot 
finds the earliest of the Pleistocene cultures — the 
" Reutelien." 
Having thus surveyed the early Pleistocene deposits 
of Belgium and of Northern France through the eyes of 
M. Rutot, and the phases of human workmanship which 
he has detected in them, our next step is to seek for the 
remains of the men who lived when such valley deposits 
were being formed. At the present time only one 
specimen is available — the famous Heidelberg mandible. 
The mandible was found in the deepest strata of a 
valley deposit, lying ten miles to the south-east of 
Heidelberg. That old University town is situated on 
the Neckar, ten miles above its junction with the Rhine 
at Mannheim. Below Heidelberg, the Neckar is joined 
by the Elenz, a stream flowing northwards along a shallow 
valley, and through a rich, agricultural country. On 
the eastern side of the valley, fully four miles above 
the junction of the Elenz with the Neckar, is the rural 
village of Mauer. Close by the village is the sand-pit 
of Mauer — also on the eastern side of the Elenz valley. 
Opposite the pit, the bottom of the valley stands 134 m. 
(440 feet) above the level of the North Sea, and two 
1 M. J. Desnoyers, Covipt. Rend., 1863, vol. Ivi. pp. 1073, 1199. 
E. T. Hamy, Pn'cis palcontolos;ie Jiumaine, Paris, 1870. M. G. Gourty, 
" Les Depots de St Prest," Bull. Soc. d'Anihrop.^ 1913, ser. 6, vol. iv. 
p. 6. _ 
