The Sun.
London, England, 1863-12-26 00:00:00

THE FEDERAL EXECUTION.

ALTONA, Dec. 25 (Evening).
The Federal Civil Commissioners have issued a
proclamation stating that Altona will be their seat
for the transaction of business. The reports hitherto
sent to Herr von Ploen at Copenhagen arc hence-
forth to be forwarded to the comm:.ssioners.
Prayers are to be put up in the churches only for
the Government, its councillors, and servants.
The Danish troops leave Neamunster today.
Duke Frederick has been proclaimed in Pinne-
ben:, Elmshorn, and Gluckstedt.

A meeting of deputies from all parts of the
country is to be held at Elmshorn on Sunday.

ARCHIEOLOGICAL DISCOVERY,

A very interesting discovery has, during the pas t
autumn, been male at Normanby, near Middlesborough, in
the North Riding of Yorkshire. In order to facilitate cer-
tain of the mining operations carried on at that place by
the Messrs.Bellle,ietl
tbhneacamtheant necessary
saer in use, itself lower y to form a new road-
way at a lower level
by four or five feet than the modern surface in the
vicinity. During the process of the necessary excavations
the attention of the engineer and workmen was drawn
to the presence of human remains. There were many
fragments of ancient pottery, portions of two broken
querns, the upper stone of a third in an unfinished
state, and eventually even a portion of a human jaw, with
three teeth. The bones were principally those of the ox,
and, judging from the form of a skull obtained in soma
degree of integrity, of bos ens. Some were of large
dimensions, and those which had contained marrow were
with few exceptions, broken across. There were besides
numerous bones of the sheep and deer, and a few of the
swine. Not a few of the shoulder-blades of the sheep or
deer were so small as to suggest the presence in Cleveland,
at the time to which the deposit belonged, of very small
varieties of the breeds represented. On none of these
bones did there appear to be any signs of gnawing—per-
haps a negative evidence of the absence of any species of
dog at the time. There were also many small bones of
various kinds, but too much decayed to admit of any at-
tempt to decide to what creatures they had originally be-
longed. There was one, however, at least, Which testified
to the presence of articles of food derived from the sea (ex-
clusive of others to be presently mentioned); and that was
a bone from the flapper, or breast-fish, of probably either
a seal or a porpoise. Some few of the larger bones
showed signs of cutting, the cut parts pre.:seiating a
rough, jagged edge, strongly suggesting that the cut-

ting instrument employed had been very blunt or very
rude. Besides these cut bones, ono other, the metatarsal
bone of a sheep or deer, was bored through transversely
as well as longitudinally, the hole being perfectly circular,
All the bones, without any exemption, were much coated, or
their hollow parts lined, with earthy phosphate of iron, which
after a few hours of exposure to the air assumed a very
beautiful blue tint, Besides the bones just noticed there
was a layer of shells—nainely, those of the common sea
mussel and the ordinary periwinkle—of six or eight inches
in thickness, 14 or 15 feet in length, and of considerable
but undetermined width, All the mussel shells had been
opened, and in no one instance did two still united at the
hinge present themselves. This shell-bed lay at a depth
of 12 to 14 feet below the old road, and, therefore, 17
to 19 feet below the modern surface. The bones, pot-
teryjand querns were most abundantly met with in the
No ef or broken
wrought
part of the deposit just above the shell-bed, and intermingled
brancheswith the
om weretr
trees,
es, twigs,ch a rl
ce
oa
avle, s
a, sticks,epecimcenni chips,
tv
,knots,
wood (pegs or the like), hazel-nuts, acorns, ling, moss,
bracken, sedges, rushes, a few seeds of plants, besides wing
cases of beetles, half of a small, well-wrought and polished
jet ring, and a rude bone peg or two. About five feet above
the shell-bed lay an ochrey-yellow band of some inches in
thickness, which, with all that lay below it (to a &lot and
a half or two feet beneath the shells), gave unquestionable
evidence of having been deposited in water not liable to
violent commotion. A careful inspection of the whole
deposit and of the surrounding locality seems to lead to the
supposition that there must have been a pool here in ancient
times. There are reasons for assuming that the bed of thi
pool originated in the geologica l movement which created
a fault in the adjacent bed of ironstone, which fault is shown
clearly, in section, a few yards beyond the deposit.- But as to
the circumstances under which the deposit was made there
is no evidence whatever on which so much as to found an
hypothesis. There may have been a species of " lake
dwelling," though no trace of its existence presented
themselves. There may have been a settlement on the
verge of the (probably) steep bank which encompassed one
side of the pool, although on this supposition it is not very
possible to account for the equable deposition of the shells
and other light matters, and still less for the diffusion
of the bones, pottery, &c., over a tolerably wide area.
It is barely possible that a family lived in huts con•
strutted in the overhanging trees. It is, perhaps, more
prooatoe LL10.4 1,110 nl,oo or the assumel dwellimr nr
dwellings may have been demolished, una no attention
drawn to it, at a period much earlier than that of the
formation of the present road—that is to say at the
time when the earlier excavations and other works neces-
sary towards quarrying the ironstone in the adjacent
bank were in process of being carried out. As to the
date of these curious remains, that is also too much a mat-
ter of conjecture ; but, from the character of the pottery,
the querns, and the jet ring, it is assumed not to be ex-
tremely remote. They are undoubtedly Celtic, and beyond
that little that is positive can be alleged. The discovery
implement or weapon might, perhaps,
have ofy kind
for a more definite judgment, but
nothing angiven
o f room
of
the edged
kind has been discovered. It may be
added that the human jaw obtained was remarkably
massive and large, and most have belonged to a person of
hugh proportions. The three teeth, which are still in their
sockets, are of great size and very much worn down ; in-
deed, nearly the whole crown is worn away--a fact which
testifies plainly enough to the coarse nature of a very con-
siderable portion of this ancient man's daily bread.