The Greenville journal. [volume] (Greenville, Ohio) 1850-1918, 1913-02-13

'the high plateau graves," as much as 700 feet
above sea level. The Oldest of all these gravels
Is very possibly of Pliocene age, and Is not
lated to the Thames valley or other existing
river valleys. which of later date than they
are. The gravel at Uckfeld (Piltdown), in which
the human jaw found, is only 120 feet above
sea level. and not far from the River Ouse,
which flows past Lewes. Probably high pla-
teau gravel existed the top of the chalk
which once stretched the Sussex Weald
and the gravels deposited much later at low
levels after the wearing away of the great mass
of chalk lying the Wealden beds contain
some material derived from these Oldest and
highest gravels. and also some Of the gravel de-
posted in every successive age as the erosion
continued. So that this bottom gravel on the
Sussex plain, only 120 feet above sea level Is
likely to- contain a mixture and assortment of all
the preceding gravels.
Hence 1t re very difficult to assign the bones
and the worked nints (shaped by man) found
in 1t to definite age. Any fragment we pick
up may be as old as the plateau gravels which
lay on the top of the chalk in the very early
Pleistocene or late Pliocene age, or may belong
to as late period that of the actual deposit
of the gravel bed in which we now find 1t i'm.
bedded.
-ne gravel about Piltdown is so thin layer
that it escaped attention from the officers of the
Geological Survey. 1t became known to Mr.
ging 1t and sitting 1t for mending roads. 1t
only exists on slightly raised parts of the valley
of the Ouse, and its makeup" is very peculiar.
1t contains iron-stone and deeply stained iron-sand
from the Weaden strata on which 1t rests and
peculiar ruddy-brown broken fints, not very
numerous, which nearly all bits of "tabu-
lar" flint, recalling those of the high plateau
gravel at Ightham. In Kent
Many of the fiints in this Piltdown gravel have
worked ms into ou0hi pIn
ments. They are of fiat shape, often triangular
In area, and show coarse but unmistakable
taking" of human workmanship. and my
panions picked up four from the surface Of a
plowed field when visited Piltdown. They are
rougher in workmanship than the Acheuilian or
even Chellean, implements of our better known
river terrace gravels. It is impossible to asso.
ciate them with those from any other locality
known to me; and should merely say to them
that they seem to be earlier than any flint i'm
plements which can be rightly called Chellean.
Later and more finely worked flint implements
have not been found in this gravel
But the most remarkable thing about this
gravel is the discovery in it, by DR.. Smith Wood
ward and Mr.. Dawson, of fragment of tooth
of mastodon and of fragments of teeth of the
Elephas eridionalis--specimens which were ex-
hibited to the Geological society
These two animals are known to occur in PHO
Gene strata--and are not found as late as the
Pleistocene Tin this part OF the world) The
teeth of the elephant In question are very differ
ent from those Of the mammoth They are found
also in the Norfolk forest-bed and in one or two
"fissures' in the South Downs filled in by an
cient sands. The remains of this elephant
abound in the Plocene of France and Italy
few fragmentary teeth of hippopotamus a
beaver, and horse, a bit of large deer's antler
and the human jaw and skull fragment complete
the list of animal remains 1t is owing to the