THE WORLD BEFORE HISTORY—IIThe World Before History--IIProfessor JOHANNES RANKETHE APPEARANCE OF MAN ON THE EARTH
THE WORLD BEFORE HISTORY—II
The World Before History--II
Professor JOHANNES RANKE
The Mystery of a Human Skull
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THE remains of the Drift fauna are usually found mixed up and washed together in caves and rock-crevices. From the investigation of the caves in Thuringia, Franconia, and elsewhere practically proceeded the first knowledge of the Drift fauna of Central Europe. Here, right among the bones of primeval animals, were also found bones and skulls of man. The strata in which they were discovered appeared undisturbed; that they came into the old burial-places of the Drift fauna subsequently—perhaps by an intentional burial of relatively recent times—was thought to be out of the question. The discovery that became most famous was Esper’s, in one of the richest caves of “Franconian Switzerland,” the Gaillenreuth cave. There, in 1774, Esper found a man’s lower jaw and shoulder-blade at a perfectly untouched spot protected by a stone projection in the cave wall, in the same loam as bones of the cave-bear and other Drift animals. Later, a human skull with some rude potsherds of clay came to light in another place. Esper argued thus:
As the human bones (lower jaw and shoulder-blade) lay among the skeletons of animals, of which the Gaillenreuth caves are full, and as they were found in what is in all probability the original stratum, I presume, and I think not without sufficient reason, that these human limbs are of equal age with the other animal fossils.
As the human bones (lower jaw and shoulder-blade) lay among the skeletons of animals, of which the Gaillenreuth caves are full, and as they were found in what is in all probability the original stratum, I presume, and I think not without sufficient reason, that these human limbs are of equal age with the other animal fossils.
The Cuvier catastrophe theory could not allow this inference; according to that theory it was a “scientific postulate” that man could not have appeared on the earth until the alluvial period, and therefore after the Drift fauna had become extinct. Therefore, in spite of appearances, the human bones must have been more recent; and it was indeed absolutely proved that the skull that Esper had found in the cave with the rude clay potsherds originated from a burial in the floor of the cave. As this was full of remains of Drift animals, the corpse, which had been covered with the earth that had been thrown up in digging the grave, was necessarily surrounded by these remains, and even appeared embedded in them.
The Story of the Caves
It was ascertained that in very early times, but yet long after the Drift Period, the dwellers near by had had a predilection for using the caves as burial-places, so that the fact of human bones coming together with bones of Drift animals in the floor of the same cave is easily explained. Moreover, it was found that from the earliest times down to the present day the caves had been used by hunters, herdsmen, and others as places of shelter in bad weather, as cooking-places, and sometimes even—especially in very early times—as regular dwelling-places for longer periods, so that refuse of all kinds, and often of all ages and forms of civilisation that the land has seen from the Drift Period down to modern times, must have got into the floors of the caves. If these were damp and soft, the remains of every century were trodden in and got to lie deeper and deeper, so that, for instance, the fragments of a cast-iron saucepan were actually found right among the bones of regular Drift animals in a cave in Upper Franconia.
The Caves do not Prove Drift Man
The discoveries of human remains in caves appeared discredited by this, and to be of no value as proofs of the co-existence of man with the Drift fauna. And indeed this position must practically be still taken at the present day: all cave-finds are to be judged with the greatest caution. They in themselves would never have been sufficient to establish the existence of Drift Man, although, according to the general change in scientific thought that led to the overthrow of Cuvier’s theory, Drift Man is now just as much a postulate of science as was formerly the case for the opposite assumption.
Finding the First Drift Man
The first sure proofs were adduced in France by Boucher de Perthes, in the Drift beds of the Somme valley, near Abbeville, at the end of the third decadeof the nineteenth century. Fully recognising the inadequacy of proof given by cave-finds, he had sought for the relics of man in the undisturbed Drift beds of gravel and coarse sand that contains the bones of Drift animals, which by their covering and depth precluded all suspicion of having been subsequently dug over. And he was successful. He had argued in exactly the same manner as Esper had formerly done, but with better right. In the stratified Drift formations every period is sharply defined by the layers of differently coloured and differently composed strata horizontally overlying one another. Here the proofs begin. They are irrefutable if it is shown that the relics of man have been there since the deposit. Being no less immovable than this stratum in which they lie, as they came with it, they were likewise preserved with it; and as they have contributed to its formation, they existed before it.
The Overthrow of Cuvier’s Famous Theory
That is the line of thought according to which Boucher de Perthes was able, in 1839, to lay before the leading experts in Paris—at their head Cuvier himself—his discoveries proving the former existence of Drift man. But his demonstrations were not then sufficient to break the old ban of prejudices that were apparently founded on such good scientific bases; his proofs of the presence of man in the Somme valley at the time of the Drift, contemporaneously with the extinct Drift animals, were ridiculed. It was twenty years before these long-neglected discoveries in the Somme valley concerning the early history of man were recognised by the scientific world. This was only made possible by Lyell, whose authority as a geologist had risen above Cuvier’s, placing the whole weight of it on Boucher’s side, after having personally travelled over the Somme valley three times in the year 1859, and having himself examined all the chief places where relics of Drift Man had been discovered. According to Lyell’s description, the Somme valley lies in a district of white chalk, which forms elevations of several hundred feet in height. If we ascend to this height we find ourselves on an extensive tableland, showing only moderate elevations and depressions, and covered uninterruptedly for miles with loam and brick earth about five feet thick and quite devoid of fossils. Here and there on the chalk may be noticed outlying patches of Tertiary sand and clay, the remains of a once extensive formation, the denudation of which has chiefly furnished the Drift gravel material in which the relics of man and the bones of extinct animals lie buried. The Drift alluvial deposit of the Somme valley exhibits nothing extraordinary in its stratification or outward appearance, nor in its composition or organic contents. The stratum in which the bones of the Drift fauna are found intermingled with the relics of man is partly a marine and partly a fluviatile deposit. The human relics in particular are mostly buried deep in the gravel; almost everywhere one has to pass down through a mass of overlying loam with land shells, or a fine sand with fresh-water molluscs, before coming to beds of gravel, in which the relics of Drift Man are found.
Animals of the Ice Age
Everything shows that the relics of man are here in a secondarysitus, deposited in the same way as the bones of extinct animals and the whole geological material in which everything is embedded. That is the reason why the finds cannot be more exactly dated. They doubtless belong to the general drift, but whether to the Postglacial Period, or the warmer Interglacial Period, cannot be decided. The fauna admits of no absolute limitation, owing to its being mixed from both periods. The mammalia most frequently found in the strata in question are the mammoth, Siberian rhinoceros, horse, reindeer, ure-ox, giant fallow-deer, cave-lion, and cave-hyena. In very similar Drift deposits of the Somme near Amiens traces of man were found beside the bones of the hippopotamus and the elephant.
These animals were chiefly prevalent in France and Germany in the Preglacial and Interglacial Periods of the Drift. Part of the animal remains found near Abbeville, particularly those of the cave-lion and cave-hyena, also point to the warmer Interglacial Period; on the other hand, the mammoth, Siberian rhinoceros, and especially the reindeer, appear to indicate with all certainty the second Glacial and Postglacial Periods. The bones of the older Drift animals may have been washed out of other primarysitus; the reindeer had certainly already taken possession of those parts of France when the relics of man were embedded.
THE OVERTHROW OF A FAMOUS THEORY OF THE ORIGIN OF THE EARTH AND MANWhen Cuvier was supreme among geologists his theory that the great geological ages ended with sudden catastrophes which annihilated all life, and that all life was then created afresh, was universally accepted. One result of this theory was the disbelief in the existence of man before the Glacial Age. Boucher de Perthes sought to establish the former existence of Drift Man on finding human relics in the Somme Valley; but not until Sir Charles Lyell threw his influence on the side of De Perthes was the Preglacial existence of man admitted, and the long-accepted theory of Cuvier overthrown.
THE OVERTHROW OF A FAMOUS THEORY OF THE ORIGIN OF THE EARTH AND MAN
When Cuvier was supreme among geologists his theory that the great geological ages ended with sudden catastrophes which annihilated all life, and that all life was then created afresh, was universally accepted. One result of this theory was the disbelief in the existence of man before the Glacial Age. Boucher de Perthes sought to establish the former existence of Drift Man on finding human relics in the Somme Valley; but not until Sir Charles Lyell threw his influence on the side of De Perthes was the Preglacial existence of man admitted, and the long-accepted theory of Cuvier overthrown.
In spite of the most eager search for similar relic-beds affording sure evidence of Drift Man, only a very few have as yet been discovered that can be placed by the side of those in the Somme valley. Two are in Germany, and are the more valuable as a more exact date can be given to them within the Drift Period. One is near Taubach (Weimar), the other at the source of the Schussen. The one at Taubach belongs to the Interglacial Period, that at the source of the Schussen to the Postglacial Period. The former lies on the moraines of the first Glacial Period, which was followed by the Interglacial Period; the latter on the moraines of the second Glacial Period, which slowly passed into the Postglacial Period.
The Climate of the Ice Age
The Drift relic-bed in the calc-tufa near Taubach lies, as we have said, over the remains of the first Glacial Period, and according to Penck, one of the best authorities on the Drift, belongs to the warmer intermediate epoch between the two great periods of glaciation. The proofs given by the plant and animal remains agree entirely with the proofs given by the conditions of stratification. In the rich fauna found there, animals indicating a cold climate are entirely absent, and a comparison of the whole of the finds proves that at the time when man was present there no kind of arctic conditions can have prevailed. There is no reindeer, no lemming. The roe, stag, wolf, brown bear, beaver, wild boar, and aurochs were at that time inhabitants of these regions, and the only inference they allow is that of a temperate climate. The mollusc fauna, in which also all Glacial forms are absent, also leads to the same conclusion; all that occur are familiar to us from those of the present day in the same district. The fauna would really appear quite modern were it not that a very ancient stamp is imparted to it by several extinct types. With the modern animals enumerated are associated the cave-lion, cave-hyena, ure-elephant, and Merckian rhinoceros, characterising the whole deposit as a distinctly Drift one, which is still further proved stratigraphically by the covering of “loess.” The Taubach relic-bed is a typical illustrationof the climatic and biological conditions of the warmer Interglacial Period; the regions of Central Europe, which had been covered with masses of ice in the first Glacial Period, had, after the ice melted, become once more accessible to the banished plants and animals of the Preglacial Period, until they were annihilated, or at least driven definitely from their old habitats by the second Glacial Period. The celebrated relic-bed at the source of the Schussen, near Schussenried, at a little distance from Ulm, brings us—in strong contrast to Taubach—into quite glacial surroundings. It was on the glacier-moraines of the last great glaciation, and belongs, therefore, to that period which must still be reckoned as part of the Drift—the Postglacial Period, which gradually passed into the warmer present period. Under the tufa and peat at the source of the Schussen we find the type of a purely northern climate, with exclusively northern flora and fauna; everything corresponds to climatic conditions such as prevail nowadays on the borders of eternal snow and ice, or begin at 70° north latitude.
Flora and Fauna of the Ice Age
Schimper, one of the best authorities on mosses at the present day, found among the plant-remains under the tufa at the source of the Schussen only mosses of northern or high Alpine forms. Among them was a moss brought from Lapland by Wahlenberg, which, according to Schimper, occurs in Norway near the chalets on the Dovrefjeld, on the borders of eternal snow, and also in Greenland, Labrador, and Canada, and on the highest summits of the Tyrolese Alps and the Sudetic Mountains. It has a special preference for the pools in which the water of the snow and glaciers flows off with its fine sand. There were also found mosses which have now emigrated to cold regions, to Greenland and the Alps. The most numerous animals were the reindeer, and yellow and Arctic foxes, as distinctly Arctic forms; and there were also the brown bear and wolf, a small ox, the hare, the large-headed wild horse—which always occurs in the Drift as the companion of the reindeer—and, lastly, the whistling swan, which now breeds in Spitzbergen or Lapland. There is an absence of all the present animal forms of Upper Swabia, as well as of the extinct Drift animals, either of which would indicate a warmer climate.
More decided climatic or biological contrasts than those afforded by the relic-beds at Taubach and the source of the Schussen could not be imagined; here we have with certainty two perfectly different periods before us, but both belonging to the general Drift Era.
Although almost all the other places where Drift Man has been found exhibit peculiarities, Taubach and the source of the Schussen seem the best representatives of the two chief types in Europe. Places giving better proof have not yet come to light anywhere in the Old World.
REVEALING THE UNKNOWN LIFE OF THE PREHISTORIC PASTA section of the earth, representing excavators in the act of discovering the remains of mammals in a cave in the South of England. Our illustration is reproduced from Buckland’s “Reliquiæ Diluvianæ,” London, 1822.
REVEALING THE UNKNOWN LIFE OF THE PREHISTORIC PAST
A section of the earth, representing excavators in the act of discovering the remains of mammals in a cave in the South of England. Our illustration is reproduced from Buckland’s “Reliquiæ Diluvianæ,” London, 1822.
Evidence from South America
At first sight the palæontological strata of South America, in which the presence of man has been proved by Ameghino, appear to give a very different picture. The animal forms occurring here contemporaneously with man deviate to such an extent from those familiar to us in the Drift of the Old World that it required the keen eye and the complete grasp of the whole palæontological material of the world that characterise Von Zittel to recognise and establish the connections here, while the discoverer himself thought that he must date his discoveries of man back to the Tertiary Period. The strata in which the earliest traces of man as yet appear to be proved in South America are the extensive “loess-like” loam deposits of the so-called “pampas” formation in Argentina and Uruguay, with their almost incomparable wealth of animal remains, particularly conspicuous among which are gigantic representatives of edentates that now occur only in small species in South America: Glyptodontia (with the giganticGlyptodon reticulatum) and dasypoda; also of the gravigrada, the giant sloth (Megatherium americanum). The toxodontia were also large animals, now extinct. But besides the specifically South American forms, numerous “North American immigrants” also appear in the pampas formation. It was only at the close of the Tertiary Period that the southern and northern halves of America grew together into one continent, and the faunæ of North and South America, so characteristically different, then began to intermingle with one another. The South American autochthons migrate northward; on the other hand, North American types—as the horse, deer, tapir, mastodon,Felis,Canis, etc.—use the newly-opened passage to extend their range of distribution. The northernanimal forms are very conspicuous among the animal world of South America, hitherto cut off from North America and characterised by the above-mentioned wonderful and, in part, gigantic edentates, marsupials, platyrhine apes, etc. Of the great elephantine animals of North America only the mastodon crossed over to South America. In the middle and latest Tertiary formations the genus mastodon is widely distributed over Europe, North Africa, and South Asia. In North America the oldest species of the mastodon appear in the Middle Tertiary (Upper Miocene), but the most species are found in the latest Tertiary (Pliocene) and the Drift (Pleistocene); in South America the mastodon is limited to the time of the pampas formation. Its tusks are long and straight, or slightly curved upward; its lower jaw also possesses two tusks, which project in a straight direction, but are considerably less than the upper tusks in size. From the results of Ameghino’s investigations man appears to have come to South America with these northern immigrants, especially with the mastodon. In Ameghino’s lists of the animals of the pampas formation Von Zittel describes man, like the animal forms enumerated above, as an immigrant from North America, and as a northern type.
According to Von Zittel’s statements there is no longer any doubt that the pampas formation, and with it early man, of South America, is to be assigned to the Drift Era; he sums up the case in these words:
In South Asia and South America the Tertiary Period is followed by Drift faunæ, which in the main are composed of species still existing at the present day, but yet show somewhat closer relations to their Tertiary predecessors.
In South Asia and South America the Tertiary Period is followed by Drift faunæ, which in the main are composed of species still existing at the present day, but yet show somewhat closer relations to their Tertiary predecessors.