Year: 1876

"a lily ISO,OOO ears Old.


In the current number Of the Over
land California geologist reviews the
geological evidence of the antiquity of a
human settlement near the present town
of Cherokee, in that State, and estimates
the age of that most ancient of discov
cred towns to be not less than 1870 900
years.


The data for all such calculation are
necessarily uncertain, as they are deriv-
ed from the present motion Of the con
tinents and present rates of erosion ;
still, from the changes that have taken
place since the pioneers of prehistoric
California left their traces on its ancient
seashore, there can be no doubt that
hundreds of centuries must have come
and gone.


The traces in question are numerous
stone mortars, found in undisturbed
white and yellow gravel of subaqueous
formation, not huviatile, underlying the


vast sheet of volcanic rock of which the


Table Mountain is part. In one in
stance mortar was found standing up
right with the pestle in it, apparently
just where it had been left by its owner.
In some cases the mortars have been
found at the depth of forty feet from
the surface of the gravel underlying
Table Mountain. The distribution of
the mortars is such as to indicate with
positiveness the former existence of a
human settlement on that ancient beach
when the water stood near the level at
which they occur; time anterior to
the volcanic outpouring which Table
Mountain records, and anterior to the
glacial epoch.


The recent geological history of that
region may be briefly summed as fol-
lows;


Previous to the placing of the NOR
tars in the position in which they have
been found the early and middle terti-
ary sea level had reached to the position
of the coal beds underlying Table Noun
tain, fully 1000 feet below the level of
Cherokee. Subsequently, in the plio.
Gene period, there was further subsi-
dence of about 1900 feet, something
like 600 feet occurring after the mortars
had been abandoned. All this, as has
been noticed, took place before this vol
canic outflow which covered up all the |
ancient detritus of the region, including
that of the ancient river (whose gravels
have furnished so much of the gold of |
California; The geological age Of the
river period was determined by Lesque- /
reux from specimens of vegetation, now
extinct, collected in the survey of the
ancient rivers specimens indicating a
ioral of the pliocene age, retaining
some characteristic miocene FORMS


After the volcanic period the land
rose again, the time of emergence EN-.
oracing the glacial period and the new
,roding period in the sierra, during
which the states and the hard meamor-
,hic green stone and the GRANTEES we're
lashed with canons 5000 feet deep by
he action of ice and running water.
Taking the rates of continental move
nent determined by Lyell, our geologist
alculates that the time required for the ,
hanges thus outlined could not have
een less than 1900 centuries. For
eriod so long preceding the c'acial
pooh as the time when the ancient I
'herokee was buried by the waters of |
he advancing sea his estimate is GER q
ainly not extravagant, though it does ,
OF transcend so enormously the time (
len have been accustomed to allow for 4
lan's residence on earth.-Scienti6e q
merioan. n