1938: Archaeology

There are three kinds of Archaeology: Prehistoric, Protohistoric and Historic. We usually think of the last as Classical Archaeology. Protohistoric archaeology is the borderland between the historic and the prehistoric. Chronologically we think of all these as enveloping deposits, which are thicker in some parts of the world than in others. The field of archaeology is so vast, both chronologically and geographically that, in this article, we shall confine ourselves to the Old World and to prehistory.

The Old World field of prehistoric archaeology is chosen because the records there go back much farther into the past than do those of the New World. These oldest records reveal not only what man's culture was but also what he was like physically; they likewise reveal the character of the associated fauna and flora.

Physical Remains.

Several fossil man-like apes have recently been found in South Africa. In 1925, in bone-bearing breccia at Taungs, near Kimberly, the skull of a young ape was discovered to which Raymond Dart gave the name Australopithecus africanus. The skull is somewhat smaller than that of a human infant of like age; but the palate is more like that of a human than of a chimpanzee baby. The milk teeth and first permanent molars are quite large. The deposit from which the skull came is Lower Pleistocene.

In 1936 Dr. Robert Broom of the Transvaal Museum, Pretoria, discovered at Sterkfontein the brain cast of a large anthropoid. Comparing this with the specimen previously discovered by Professor Dart, Dr. Broom found differences enough to place the Sterkfontein ape in a distinct group, to which he gave the name Australopithecus transvaalensis. It is allied to the chimpanzee and gorilla, and only a little larger than the former.

Two years later at Kromdraai, near Sterkfontein, Dr. Broom discovered a skull not unlike that of a female gorilla; it has very prominent brow ridges. The dentition shows a remarkable mixture of human and ape characteristics. The canines are smaller than in the gorilla; the premolars are more human than ape-like, having only one root. The molars have several human characteristics, especially in method of wear, and cusp six is prominent as in man. To this new species Dr. Broom has given the name Paranthropus robustus. It dates from the Middle Pleistocene. All these South African man-like apes resemble man more closely than do either chimpanzee or gorilla. Recent finds of long bones at Kromdraai and Sterkfontein seem to indicate that Broom's two new species were bipedal.

Sites Excavated.

Asia and Africa.

During the past ten years southeastern Asia has yielded much evidence bearing on the physical characteristics of early man. The principal sites involved are: the caves of Choukoutien, not far from Peiping; Ngandong on the Solo river, Java, and the Trinil deposits, also in Java. It will be recalled that it was in the Trinil deposits that Eugene Dubois discovered Pithecanthropus (1891). In 1937 Dr. G. H. R. von Königswald discovered, in the Trinil formation, an almost complete brain case of Pithecanthropus erectus. In July 1938, from the same area he collected a large fragment of an additional skull. The new material consists of a cranium with three upper teeth and right half of the lower jaw with four teeth. The prominent flattening of the cranial cap, so specific for the two Pithecanthropus skulls known hitherto, is completely lacking in the case of this new cranium. On the other hand the latter has the following peculiarities in common with both Sinanthropus and Pithecanthropus skulls: lowness of the entire cranial cap and the position of the greatest transverse diameter, the latter undoubtedly having been situated above the origin of the zygomatic arch, as is the case with all Sinanthropus and Pithecanthropus skulls.

According to von Königswald these new finds prove definitely 'that Pithecanthropus is human. Lacking well developed mastoid processes and having such a low brain capacity and an unreduced third lower molar, Pithecanthropus is more primitive than Sinanthropus, and is the most primitive fossil man now known.'

Dr. Franz Weidenreich agrees with von Königswald that Pithecanthropus is human and not ape. However, he differs from von Königswald in that he believes Sinanthropus to be more primitive than Pithecanthropus, although both belong to the same group of hominids when compared with other human forms. Sinanthropus remains recently found in the caves of Choukouten, China, reveal that there exists a great variability ranging from small and low skulls of about 850 c.c., to larger and higher skulls with a cranial capacity of 1,200 c.c., thereby connecting these primitive forms with those of the Neanderthal group. 'One of the most striking facts disclosed by the Sinanthropus series is that very primitive and far advanced features occur side by side, either in the same individual or in different ones.' Weidenreich believes Pithecanthropus to be closely related to the Ngandong man, Javanthropus soloensis.

Next in importance to the discoveries in Africa and southeastern Asia are those recently made near the foot of Mount Carmel, Palestine (in the Wady Mughara), by joint expeditions of the American School of Prehistoric Research and the British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem. Parts of more than a dozen individuals of Neanderthal man and several more skeletons of a Mesolithic (Natufian) race were unearthed. Preliminary reports of these finds have already been made in the Bulletin of the American School. The final report on the Neanderthal reunions, entitled: 'The Stone Age Races of Mount Carmel' will appear early in 1939; the authors are Sir Arthur Keith and Theodore D. McCown. The Memoir on the Natufian will by McCown.

England and France.

Marston's discovery of parts of a human skull, deep in the gravels of the 100-foot terrace of the Lower Thames valley, at Swanscombe (Kent), has again brought to the fore the problem of the relatively great antiquity of the Homo sapiens type of man. On archaeological and geological grounds the skull has been referred to the Lower Paleolithic Period (Acheulian). The skull is of the modern type.

In 1938 J. Maury, S. Blanc and Prof. H. Breuil unearthed three well preserved skeletons from the station of Laugerie-Haute-Ouest, at Les Eyzies-de-Tayac (Dordogne). They are probably Early Magdalenian.

Was the average life period of early man very much shorter, if any, than that of modern man? Professor Henri Vallois has just completed a study of all available skulls of the Neanderthal race and arrives at the following figures: 55 per cent died before the age of 20; 40 per cent died between the ages of 20 and 40; 5 per cent died between the ages of 40 and 50.

Cultural Remains.

Near East.

Geographically and in other respects the Near East might well have been an important gateway of prehistoric migration. Recent researches in this area prove conclusively that it was. A number of institutions have contributed to these researches, including the American School of Prehistoric Research, the British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem, the Sladen Fund (British), the Field Museum of Chicago and the Institut de Paléontologie Humaine, Paris.

Practically the entire gamut of Old Stone Age culture has already been found here, although much still remains to be done. The most complete studies have been made in the coastal region. For example, the three caves in the Wady Mughara, near the foot of Mount Carmel, combined, reveal the following sequence, beginning with the oldest: Tayacian, Upper Acheulian, Lower Levalloiso-Mousterian, Upper Levalloiso-Mousterian. Lower Aurignacian, Middle Aurignacian, Upper Aurignacian, Lower Natufian (Mesolithic), Upper Natufian, Bronze Age and Recent.

A joint British-American expedition in Iraq excavated two caves in southern Kurdistan, which contained the remains of a Levalloiso-Mousterian, resembling the Upper Levalloiso-Mousterian of Palestine, also a blade industry of the Upper Aurignacian type with shouldered points and many small notched blades; this industry resembles that found at Kostienki, Gagarino and other stations of the south Russian plain, rather than the Palestine Aurignacian.

During the summer of 1938, an expedition of the American School of Prehistoric Research made excavations in the cave of Batcho Kiro, near Drenovo, Bulgaria. The section contained Paleolithic deposits (Mousterian and Aurignacian), surmounted by layers containing pottery and a recent fauna.

India.

In a preliminary report the American Southeast Asiatic Expedition gives interesting geological results by the Director, Hellmut de Terra, and archaeological results by Hallam L. Movius, Jr., a member of the Expedition. For Burma, Movius reports the finding of Lower and Upper Paleolithic, as well as Neolithic cultural remains; he did not find anything that could be classed as Mesolithic. Regarding correlations the Lower Paleolithic of Burma seems to fit into the same Middle Pleistocene horizon as the Trinil beds, Choukoutien, the basal Narbada, and the Abbevillean from Madras and the Punjab. Typologically it displays few analogies with India.

Those who are interested in the recent progress of prehistory in Soviet Russia should consult articles by Henry Field and Eugene Prostov (Amer. Anthrop. vols. 38, 39, and 40, 1936, '37, '38); also by Eugene A. Golomshtok (Trans. Amer. Philos. Soc., vol. XIX. Pt. II, 1938).

Middle Stone Age.

Much is being done to fill the gap between the Old Stone Age and the New Stone Age. This gap, once supposed to be a real hiatus, is being filled by a Middle Stone Age, variously known as Mesolithic, Azilian-Tardenoisian (France), and Natufian (Palestine); in Denmark the term Maglemosean is also employed.

Germany.

Prior to 1932 the Upper Paleolithic was unknown in northern Germany. In 1933 work was begun by Alfred Rust and others at a site between Meiendorf and Ahrensburg, northeast of Hamburg. This site, known as Meiendorf, has yielded a great quantity of reindeer antlers and bones (71 individuals). The evidence now goes to show that this was a summer camp of hunters who in winter must have lived farther south. The cultural remains of flints, bone and antler are of Magdalenian type. Meiendorf has now become the type station for the so-called Hamburg culture. Rust next turned his attention to the nearby station of Stellmoor, which is throwing a flood of light, not only on the Upper Paleolithic but also on the Mesolithic: for it reveals a layer of Hamburg culture at the bottom of the section, some three meters above which is a Mesolithic deposit (known locally as the Ahrensburg culture). The Stellmoor section thus bridges the gap between the Upper Paleolithic tundra and the Maglemose forest culture (Mesolithic).

J. G. D. Clark believes the Maglemose culture to be a composite of three strains: (1) microlithic, (2) heavy element (antler, bone, stone and flint axes, adzes and clubs), reflecting adaptation to forest conditions, (3) certain reminiscences from the Upper Paleolithic traditions. This goes largely to substantiate what G. Schwantes, in a measure, foresaw as early as 1925.

Holland.

A Paleolithic horizon has just been reported for the first time in Holland. The station is Koerhuisbeck, near Deventer. A section, some 8 meters in thickness, at the top contained a layer with many human and animal bones, also a kind of paddle, or side rudder, like those used in Viking ships. Below this layer were layers of gravel. Between the second and third level of gravels were found horns of Cervus elaphus worked by man, human bones and those of horse, ox and deer, a hammer-ax, etc. (Maglemose or probably later). Under the third layer of gravel, in grey sand, parts of three human skulls were unearthed (probably Upper Paleolithic). The finds in the fourth layer of gravel included: remains of Elephas primigenius, Bos primigenius, Rhinoceros tichorhinus, Cervus megaceros and Sus scrofa. This level is certainly not later than Upper Paleolithic.