the valleys of the Thames and its affluents, it will be well to discuss
the various localities in the immediate neighbourhood of London, so as
not to disturb the sequence of the Figures which is necessarily that of
my first edition. It will be needless to do this at any great length,
as the principal investigator of the gravels around London, to whom
indeed the greater part of the discoveries are due—Mr. Worthington
G. Smith—has given full particulars in his excellent book, “Man, the
Primeval Savage.”[2565]
[Illustration: Fig. 452.—Hackney Down. 1∕2]
* * * * *
In the British Museum is an oval implement, formerly in the collection
of the late Rev. Dr. Sparrow Simpson, F.S.A., shown in |584| Fig.
452, and found by Mr. G. H. Gaviller in gravel dug at Hackney Down,
to the north-east of London, and not far from Shacklewell. It is of
ochreous flint, slightly rolled, and in form remarkably like that
from Bournemouth, Fig. 476. Though the exact place whence it came is
unknown, there can be no doubt of its belonging to the Hackney Down
gravels, which may be regarded as identical in age and character
with those of Shacklewell, which have been described by Sir Joseph
Prestwich.[2566] The surface of the ground at Hackney Down[2567] is 70
feet above Ordnance Datum, and in 1866 a shaft was there sunk through
gravel and sand, to a depth of 22 feet. In the sandy beds at the base
Mr. G. J. Smith[2568] discovered numerous land and freshwater shells,
and among them the _Hydrobia marginata_—already mentioned as having
been found in the Bedford Drift, and as being no longer an inhabitant
of Britain—and the _Corbicula fluminalis_, which has already been
cited as occurring near Cambridge, and of which more will be said
immediately. The Shacklewell gravel mainly consists of subangular
broken flints, some large flints but little worn, Lower Tertiary
pebbles, a few quartz and sandstone pebbles, and some rolled blocks of
hard Tertiary sandstone. In the pit described by Sir Joseph Prestwich
there is, at a depth of about 8 feet, a bed of sandy clay intercalated
in the gravel, and containing mammalian remains, numerous land and
freshwater shells, and remains of oak, elm, alder, and hazel. The group
of shells procured here resembles that of the Salisbury Drift, of which
mention will be made hereafter.
Since 1854, when his paper was read, numerous specimens of the
_Corbicula fluminalis_, or, as it was formerly called, the _Cyrena
consobrina_, have been found here by Sir Joseph Prestwich, Sir Charles
Lyell,[2569] and others, including myself. This shell, of a mollusc
no longer living in Europe, though still found in the Nile and in
several Asiatic rivers, has also been found in the Drift deposits
of the Somme at Menchecourt, near Abbeville, associated with flint
implements; and is likewise to be met with in the drift deposits
of the Thames at Gray’s Thurrock, Ilford, Erith, and Crayford, in
several of which implements have now been found. The beds at these
places have by some geologists been regarded as belonging to an older
and Pre-glacial period; but the discovery of an implement at Hackney
Down raises a presumption that the gravel there is, like other flint
implement-bearing gravels, Post-glacial; and the discovery of an
implement in beds of fluviatile origin at a still higher level than
those of Hackney Down corroborates this view, as the lower bed is
probably the more modern.
The fluviatile beds in question were exposed in two brick-pits at
Highbury New Park, near Stoke Newington, and attention was first called
to them in August, 1868,[2570] by the late Mr. Alfred Tylor, F.G.S.
The surface of the ground at the more eastern of these two pits is,
according to Mr. Tylor, 102 feet above Ordnance Datum; and 22 feet
below the surface there is a bed of clay 2 feet thick, full of land
and freshwater shells, accompanied by much wood. There are |585| also
shells in the lower part of the reddish loam or brick-earth immediately
above the clay. The shells are said to consist of _Helix_, _Zua_,
_Clausilia_, _Succinea_, _Carychium_, _Limnæa_, _Planorbis_, _Valvata_,
_Pisidium_, and _Cyclas_; to which Mr. J. Wood Mason, F.G.S.,[2571]
added _Achatina_, _Bythinia_, _Pupa_, and _Velletia_.
On reading the account of this discovery, I was at once impressed with
the possibility of the occurrence of palæolithic implements in the
deposit; and accordingly in September, 1868, I visited the pit with the
view of searching for them, taking with me my youngest son, Norman,
who had a quick eye, and an almost instinctive power of recognizing
a worked flint. Our search was soon rewarded, for immediately on
descending into the lower part of the pit, where the shell-bearing beds
were exposed, my son picked up the remarkably well-formed implement
shown in Fig. 453. It was not _in situ_, but was lying in the bottom of
the pit; and judging from the staining upon a portion of its surface,
it appears to have been derived from the brick-earth, rather than from
the more shelly beds below.
[Illustration: Fig. 453.—Highbury New Park. 1∕2]
It is well adapted for being held in the hand as a sort of knife or
chopper, having a thick rounded back formed of the natural crust of
the nodule of flint from which it was formed. One face of it has been
the result of a single blow, and its surface is that of a portion of
a what irregular cone, at the apex of which the blow was struck, by
|586| which it was produced. The other face, as will be seen by the
figure, has been fashioned by first roughly chipping the implement to
a curved edge, by blows administered on the flatter face, and then
neatly trimming this edge to a regular sweep by secondary chipping. The
ends have also been trimmed into shape. At the upper end, as shown in
the figure, a small piece has been broken off, but otherwise the edge
is uninjured. In character it is identical with the implement from
the Santon Downham gravel, Fig. 437, and it closely resembles some of
the large trimmed flakes from High Lodge, near Mildenhall, and the
“choppers” from the cave of Le Moustier. The surface of the flint is
stained ochreous in places, and presents much the same appearance as do
some of the implements from the brick-earth at Hoxne.
It was in consequence of my publication of these discoveries that the
attention of Mr. Worthington Smith was directed to the gravels of
North-Eastern London, among which his labours have been crowned with
such marked success. Not only has he found palæolithic implements
in the City,[2572] Gray’s Inn Lane, Clerkenwell, London Fields,
Dalston, Kingsland, Homerton, Hackney, Lower Clapton, Upper Clapton,
Stamford Hill, Mildmay Park, South Hornsey, Abney Park Cemetery,
Stoke Newington, and Shacklewell, but he has been able to identify
the old surface of the ground, which was occupied by the early men
who chipped out the implements. To this old land-surface he has given
the name of the “Palæolithic floor,” and he has been able to trace
its existence over a considerable area of ground on the western as
well as the eastern side of the river Lea.[2573] It consists of a
stratum of five or six inches of subangular ochreous gravel, in some
places, however, only one or two inches in thickness, or only visible
as a tone of colour. On, and imbedded in this floor among rolled and
waterworn stones and bones, black, sharp and unabraded implements of
flint occur, together with flakes which, in some instances, have been
susceptible of being replaced in their original juxtaposition. Below
the floor are usually thin beds of sand containing shells of land and
freshwater mollusca, and beds of gravel, sometimes as much as 12 feet
thick, containing palæolithic implements more or less abraded. The sand
is not always present. Above the floor are usually contorted loamy
beds of “warp and trail,” generally 4 to 6 feet thick, including the
superficial humus. These seem to be of subaërial origin and may be due
to a lengthened prevalence of a cold and rainy climate. The fauna of
the gravels is described as including _Felis spelæa_, _Hyæna_, _Elephas
primigenius_, _E. antiquus_, _Rhinoceros megarhinus_, _R. leptorhinus_,
and _R. tichorhinus_, _Cervus tarandus_, and _Megaceros hibernicus_.
Remains of _Antilope Saïga_ have, I believe, been also found. Among the
testaceous remains _Corbicula fluminalis_ and _Hydrobia marginata_ have
already been noted.
Another diligent investigator of the gravels of North-East London,
who has also treated of the Palæolithic floor, is Mr. J. E.
Greenhill.[2574] He has given some interesting sections, showing how
the waterworn, abraded implements underlie those of the Palæolithic
floor which are quite unworn.[2575] Professor Rupert Jones, F.R.S., has
also written on |587| the subject. The best geological account is that
given by Mr. W. Whitaker, F.R.S.[2576]
By the kindness of Mr. Worthington Smith most of the important
specimens that he has found are now in my collection. I am further
indebted to him for the use of the blocks illustrating some of the
implements.[2577] Fig. 453A exhibits a finely pointed implement from
Lower Clapton. Its surface is lustrous and it shows at its butt part of
the original crust of the nodule of flint out of which it was chipped.
[Illustration: Fig. 453A.—Lower Clapton. 1∕2]
The fine ovate implement,[2578] Fig. 453B, came from the 12 feet
stratum at Stamford Hill. It is of dark colour, lustrous, and has the
angles slightly abraded.
A small example from the Palæolithic floor at Stoke Newington is shown
in Fig. 453C.[2579] The edges are still quite sharp, and at one place
there appear to be traces of use. A quartzite[2580] implement from the
same locality is shown in Fig. 453D.
Implements presumably of Palæolithic Age have been found in the bed
of the Thames. One from Battersea is of peculiar form, with a |588|
truncated butt, and has been presented to the Christy Collection by Sir
A. Wollaston Franks, F.R.S. Another from Hammersmith is in the same
collection, having been formerly in that of the late Rev. Dr. Sparrow
Simpson, F.S.A. It is 8 1∕4 inches long, and much resembles that from
Reculver, Fig. 458, though somewhat longer in its proportions and
thicker in the butt. It is much rolled and water-worn, so that it has
probably belonged to a bed of gravel at a much higher level than that
from which it was dredged up. Another (5 5∕16 inches) from the bed of
the Thames at the Chelsea Suspension Bridge was found by Mr. Lambton
Young, C.E., in 1854, before general attention had been directed to
such relics. Mr. G. F. Lawrence, of Wandsworth, has ovate specimens
from the Thames, at Wandsworth, Battersea, Putney, and Richmond, all
but the latter much rolled.
[Illustration: Fig. 453B.—Stamford Hill. 1∕2]
[Illustration: Fig. 453C.—Stoke Newington Common. 1∕2]
It will be most convenient to reserve the discoveries in the South of
London and in the valley of the |589| Lea for future pages, and to
proceed up the Thames valley towards its sources.
* * * * *
Nearly ten miles to the west of London, and on the northern side of the
Thames, the careful researches of General Pitt Rivers, F.R.S., have
been amply rewarded, he having found several implements of well-marked
palæolithic types, and numerous flakes, in the gravels of Ealing Dean
and Acton.[2581] He has fully described the localities and given
sections of the beds in a communication to the Geological Society.[2582]
[Illustration: Fig. 453D.—Stoke Newington Common. 1∕2]
* * * * *
At the former spot, the surface of the ground is 92 feet above
Ordnance Datum, and here several implements have been found. At Acton
the surface is from 60 to 80 feet above high-water mark, and here an
implement of oval form was found beneath 7 feet of stratified sand and
gravel, and resting on the clay beneath; another, of pointed form, was
found in the middle of the gravel, about 10 feet from the surface, and
beneath beds of sand 8 feet in thickness. Others were found in gravel
from the same spot, and from Mill Hill, half-a-mile to the westward,
which had been spread on the roads. One of the pointed implements
from Ealing Dean is shown in Fig. 454. In form it much resembles that
from Reculver, Fig. 458, though smaller in size. Like all the other
implements from these two spots, it is stained of the ochreous colour
of the gravel, and has had its angles worn away by being rolled in
water along with the other constituents of the gravel. The flakes,
which are comparatively abundant, are for the most part |590| large
and rude, but many appear to have had their edges chipped by use. Some
have been wrought into the scraper form. Cores or blocks of flint from
which flakes have been struck have also been found.
In May, 1871, an implement, 8 inches long, and of rather less tapering
form than that from Ealing, Fig. 454, was found at Acton, beneath 13
feet of sand and gravel, at a spot where the surface is 70 feet above
high-water mark. General Pitt Rivers has also seven or eight flakes of
flint, one of them 5 1∕2 inches long and 1 inch wide, which were found
together, beneath 9 feet of brick-earth and gravel, in excavating for
the foundations of a house at Acton. Their edges are sharp and unworn,
so that they must have been deposited where they were found, prior to
the accumulation of the 9 feet of drifted beds above them. They lay in
a bed of ochreous sandy clay, about 1 foot in thickness, which reposed
immediately on the blue London Clay.
[Illustration: Fig. 454.—Ealing Dean. 1∕2]
In Acton village, the beds of Drift which constitute the first patch
of gravel occurring at so high a level as we go westward from London,
and which form a sort of terrace overlooking the broad valley of
the Thames, attain a thickness of 18 feet, and consist of layers of
sub-angular gravel, mixed with yellow and white sand, very irregularly
stratified. The gravel consists principally of flints and Tertiary
pebbles, with some of quartz and quartzite. A few mammalian remains,
including a tooth of _Elephas primigenius_, have been found in these
beds, and south of Ealing Park[2583] land and freshwater shells. At
|591| a lower level, and cut off from the upper gravels by an outcrop
of London Clay, is a wide terrace of alluvial deposits at an average
height of about 20 feet above high-water mark, and a lower terrace
still is to be found in the immediate neighbourhood of the river.
General Pitt Rivers’s researches in the mid-terrace beds of gravel and
brick-earth have not produced any implements of the River-drift types,
but he has obtained animal remains which were identified by the late
Mr. G. Busk, F.R.S., as those of _Elephas primigenius_, _Rhinoceros
hemitæchus_, _Hippopotamus major_, _Bos primigenius_, _Bison priscus_,
_Cervus tarandus_, and other species of deer. They occur invariably at
the base of the gravel 12 or 13 feet from the surface. The late Mr.
Thomas Belt, F.G.S.,[2584] has speculated on the age and character of
the Acton deposits.
Mr. J. Allen Brown, F.G.S.,[2585] has diligently continued these
researches, and in laminated clay, 200 feet above O.D. at the Mount,
Ealing, has found an ochreous flake trimmed at the edge. At Creffield
Road, Acton,[2586] Middlesex, he has discovered another “Palæolithic
floor,” having found more than 600 flakes and implements in an area of
not more than 40 feet square. Besides implements from Acton and Ealing
up to 130 feet above O.D. he has described specimens from East Sheen,
on the other side of the Thames, and Hanwell,[2587] Iver, Gunnersbury,
Kew, Turnham Green, and Dawley, near West Drayton. An ovate implement
from Dawley is of felsite. He has also described implements found at
Southall[2588] associated with remains of _Elephas primigenius_. A
pointed specimen from Southall is made of quartzite. At Hounslow[2589]
also implements have been found. It is possible that the gravels at
West Drayton belong to the valley of the Colne rather than to that of
the Thames, as also those at Hillingdon, where in the Town-pit, 180
feet above O.D., Mr. Brown has found palæolithic implements.
Farther west, at Langley and at Burnham, implements have been found
in the gravels. One from Burnham was given to me by Mr. E. Sawyer. He
has also found a broad-pointed implement at Cookham, near Maidenhead.
They have likewise been discovered at Ruscombe,[2590] Taplow,[2591]
Maidenhead, and Marlow. A very broad-pointed implement (5 1∕2 inches)
found in high-level gravel at Cookham, Maidenhead, has been shown to me
by Mr. E. Sawyer. In my own collection are specimens from the majority
of the other localities here enumerated. In form and character they
approximate so closely to those from similar deposits elsewhere that it
seems needless to figure any of them.
Higher up the river Thames, the next important discoveries to recite
are those which have been made in and near Reading by Dr. Joseph
Stevens. At Grovelands,[2592] about 80 feet above the level of the
|592| river, near the junction of the Kennet and the Thames, the Drift
deposits are ferruginous and about 15 feet thick. In them were found a
tooth of a mammoth and numerous implements, principally of ovate forms
and made of flint, but among them one made of quartzite. At Redlands,
at a lower level, about 40 feet above the river, mammoth remains occur,
as also at the Kennet Mouth Pit, Newtown, where a kite-shaped implement
was found. The geological position and structure of the Redlands beds
have been described by Prof. Poulton, F.R.S.[2593] In 1882 I found in
the gravel at Pig’s Green, near Reading, the butt-end of a pointed
implement, which had been originally about 4 1∕2 inches long and had
lost its point before being deposited in the Drift. The gravel was
subangular and ochreous, and contained from 15 to 20 per cent. of
quartzite pebbles. Flint flakes were fairly abundant, but finished
implements, scarce. On the other side of the river, at Caversham, Dr.
Stevens has found implements in gravel 120 feet above the level of the
Thames. I have myself found an acutely-pointed implement (4 inches) in
the same beds.
* * * * *
These Caversham Beds have been well described by Mr. O. A.
Shrubsole.[2594] At Toots Farm the implements are usually pointed,
as also at Shiplake, at a distance of about three miles and at a
slightly lower level. At Henley Road, Caversham, about 59 feet above
the Thames, he obtained a flat ovoid implement of flint. A molar of
_Elephas primigenius_ was found at this spot. South of the Thames,
besides the pits mentioned by Dr. Stevens, Mr. Shrubsole enumerates
the following localities: a cutting of the South Western Railway at
Earley, one of the Great Western Railway at Sonning, a gravel-pit at
Charvil Hill, Sonning, and a brick-yard at Ruscombe, near Twyford. In
the last-mentioned place several implements of various types have been
found. Some extremely doubtful specimens, probably of purely natural
origin, have been found on Finchampstead Ridges,[2595] but in gravel
at Wokingham[2596] a large highly finished pointed implement has been
obtained by Mr. P. Sale.
Some more or less worked flints from the Reading[2597] gravels have
been described and figured by Mr. O. A. Shrubsole, who has assigned
uses to what he terms “the less familiar forms of Palæolithic Flint
Implements.”
Still higher up the Thames, near Wallingford, there is a considerable
spread of gravel, some of it at a distance of two miles or more from
the existing streams. In this gravel implements have been found, though
up to the present time in no great abundance. I |593| have a fine
kite-shaped specimen of the type of Plate I., No. 6 (5 1∕2 inches),
that was found at Gould’s Heath, East of Wallingford, and two from
Turner’s Court,[2598] rather nearer the town. In all three cases the
flint has become more or less whitened. I have another large flat ovate
implement more like Plate I., No. 16, that was found at Cholsey, on the
other side of the river. It is more lustrous and not so much whitened.
Another was found on the surface at Ipsden,[2599] 3 miles S.E. of
Wallingford.
In the neighbourhood of Oxford a fair number of palæolithic implements
have been found, some of which are in the University Museum. The first
of these was a fine specimen with a heavy butt and pointed tip (broken
off), procured, in 1874, by Sir Joseph Prestwich from gravel on the
left bank of the Cherwell, at Marston Ferry, not more than from 4 to
5 feet from the surface. Another, ovate (3 3∕4 inches), was obtained
by the late Professor Rolleston from the foundations of the New
Schools in the High Street, in 1878, and two more of ruder workmanship
came from the site of the Girls’ High School in the Banbury Road, in
1880. Yet another was found below Oxford by the side of Bagley Wood,
opposite Iffley. The principal discoveries have, however, been made
at Wolvercote, about 1 1∕2 miles north of Oxford, whence many have
been collected by Mr. A. M. Bell,[2600] from whose account of the
discoveries I have been quoting. Among the specimens in his and other
collections are pointed and ovate implements, a fine example of the
shoe-shaped type, like Fig. 429 (8 1∕2 inches), trimmed flakes and a
hammer-stone. One of Mr. Bell’s pointed implements has been chipped out
of quartzite. The brick-earth and gravel deposits lie in what appears
to be an old river-channel, which has been cut into the Oxford clay
and the superimposed Northern Drift to a depth of about 17 feet from
the surface. It is at the base of this channel that the implements
are found. In the sand near the base nine or ten species of land and
freshwater shells occur, and in a peaty bed immediately above the sand
and gravel the remains of various plants; but both the testaceous and
vegetable remains belong to species still found in the neighbourhood.
Mammoth, rhinoceros, and hippopotamus as well as _Corbicula fluminalis_
have, however, been found in the Oxford gravels. The beds at Wolvercote
above the peat consist of clay and sand deposited evenly in successive
layers, but towards the surface they are |594| traversed by an
irregular line of “trail,” such as is often seen above palæolithic
deposits and for which it is so difficult to account.
Mr. Percy Manning, F.S.A., possesses several palæolithic implements
found near Oxford. Among eleven specimens from Wolvercote, mostly
tongue-shaped, is one of brown flint 9 1∕2 inches long and 4 1∕2 inches
broad, sharply pointed with a truncated butt and the sides curving
outwards somewhat like Fig. 475. Another fine implement from the same
place has straighter sides and is 6 3∕4 inches long. The others are
smaller, but among them is one of pointed form rather rudely chipped
from a quartzite pebble.
Mr. Manning has also three implements dredged from a backwater of the
Thames between Oxford and North Hinksey, one of them (4 3∕4 inches)
like Fig. 422, but more roughly chipped and much waterworn. Another (4
inches) is like Fig. 436, but more pointed. The third (5 1∕8 inches),
is a remarkably symmetrical ovate-lanceolate implement, in outline like
Plate II., No. 11, made out of a pebble of quartzite, or possibly of
chert. This also is waterworn.
At Broadwell, Oxon, on the borders of Gloucestershire, Mr. Manning
found an implement (4 1∕4 inches) resembling Fig. 459, apparently from
gravel dug upon the spot. The village of Broadwell lies about 3 miles
to the north of the Thames.
In my former edition I called attention to the discovery in the valley
of the Wey, at Peasemarsh, between Guildford and Godalming, by the late
Mr. Whitbourn, F.S.A.,[2601] some sixty years ago, of the implement
shown in Fig. 455, which is now in my own collection. It was found
embedded in the gravel in a layer of sand about 4 or 5 feet from the
surface, in apparently undisturbed ground. Mr. Whitbourn had heard of
remains of large animals having been discovered in the same beds, but
not in very close proximity to the spot where the implement was found.
It is, as will be seen by the figure, of a different shape from the
majority of the implements found in the River-drift, being very broad
at the base and short in proportion to its width. The flint of which it
consists is grey and slightly ochreous. At the base is a considerable
portion of the original crust of the flint, which is stained of a dull
red. The gravel beds, in which it was found, have been described by Mr.
R. A. C. Godwin-Austen, F.R.S.[2602] They rest on Wealden Clay, and
in places, on beds of the Lower Greensand. The material principally
consists of sub-angular chalk flints, and |595| in it have been found
numerous remains of _Elephas primigenius_. In places, the gravel
overlies what appears to have been an old land-surface, in the mould
of which fragments of branches of trees, and bones of ox and elephant,
have been found uninjured and lying together. Mr. Godwin-Austen does
not record the discovery of any land or freshwater shells in the
gravels, nor on visiting the spot was I able to find any, or any more
worked flints. In the Woodwardian Museum, at Cambridge, is an implement
of palæolithic type, and of the ovate form, found higher up the valley
of the Wey, near Alton, but on the surface, and not in gravel.
[Illustration: Fig. 455.—Peasemarsh, Godalming. 1∕2]
At Farnham, between Alton and Godalming, many palæolithic implements
have been secured from the gravels of the valley of the Wey,
principally through the intelligent care of Mr. Frank Lasham, of
Guildford, and Mr. H. A. Mangles, F.G.S., of Littleworth Cross,
Tongham. The former has contributed a paper on “Palæolithic Man” to
the Surrey Archæological Society,[2603] and has kindly given me much
information on the subject. The beds of gravel are from 10 to 40 feet
deep, and lie upon the Lower Greensand. They attain an elevation of
364 feet[2604] above the mean sea-level, or about 150 feet above the
present bed of the river, and are principally dug in pits on the
southern or right side |596| of the Wey towards Wracklesham, pits
which have furnished several hundreds of palæolithic implements of
various forms and sizes. The oval and ovate seem to predominate, but
there have been found not a few fine pointed implements. Associated
with the more sharply preserved specimens, are many of dark ochreous
colour, with their angles much abraded, which in all probability have
been brought down by the old river from beds higher up its valley.
Remains of mammoth occur occasionally in the gravels. Some specimens
of the implements are preserved in the Charterhouse School Museum.
Mr. Lasham informs me of an implement having been found in gravel at
Peperharow, of a part of one near Farley Heath, and of one found at
Frimley,[2605] in the valley of the Blackwater.
The discoveries of palæolithic implements in the valley of the Colne
near its junction with the Thames, have already been recorded. In
the valley of the Misbourne, an affluent of the Colne, an implement
was found in 1891 in digging the foundations of the bridge over the
Metropolitan Extension Railway, just north of Great Missenden. It is
of a thick ovate form, made of grey flint, rather narrower than Pl.
II., No. 18, and with small flat surfaces of the original crust of the
flint left about the middle of each side. The specimen is in my own
collection.
In the valley of the Gade, in Hertfordshire, a few have been found
by myself. The first of these was lying on the surface of a ploughed
field near Bedmond,[2606] in the parish of Abbot’s Langley, at a spot
which, though probably 160 feet above the level of the nearest part
of the stream, is towards the bottom of one of the lateral valleys
leading into the main valley of the Gade, between Boxmoor and Watford.
The implement, which has unfortunately lost its point, is remarkably
similar in form and size to that from Gray’s Inn Lane, Fig. 451. The
flint of which it is made has become nearly white and porcellanous on
both faces, though more so on one than on the other. In places it has
been so much altered in structure that it can be cut with a knife. I
have noticed this feature in flints which have lain long in pervious
red brick-earth, and this leads me to suppose that the implement may
have been derived from some beds of that character at the spot where
it was found, though on this point I have no direct |597| evidence.
In 1892[2607] I found another small implement (4 inches) of rude ovate
form, among some stones recently placed in a rut at Bedmond Hill. Here,
again, there is no evidence as to the exact geological position. Nor
is there with regard to two other implements, both of which I found in
1868, in gravel laid on the towing-path of the Grand Junction Canal,
which is there united with the Gade, between Apsley and Nash Mills,
about two miles south of Hemel Hempstead. There is, however, no doubt
of the gravel in which they lay having been dredged or dug from the
bottom of the valley in the immediate neighbourhood. One of them, of
grey flint, is a neatly-chipped, flat implement, of ovate outline,
about 4 inches long, in form much like Fig. 468, from Lake. The other
is imperfect, but appears to have been originally of much the same
character, though flatter on one face. It is deeply stained of an
ochreous colour, and its angles are considerably waterworn. I have
searched in the gravels of the neighbourhood for other specimens, but
as yet in vain. I may add that during the formation of this part of
the canal, some eighty years ago, an elephant’s tooth was found in the
gravel, within about 200 yards of the spot where I discovered one of
the implements.
Other specimens are reported to have been found near the head of the
tributary valley of the Bulbourne, at Wigginton, near Tring.
At Watford, Herts, on the left bank of the Colne, in gravel near Bushey
Park, at a height of about 40 feet above the level of the existing
river, Mr. Clouston has found several implements of ochreous flint of
various types. He has kindly given me a square-ended flake, much like
Fig. 426A, from High Lodge, Mildenhall.
Some of the discoveries made by Mr. Worthington G. Smith were in
localities within the valley of the Ver, an affluent of the Colne,
rather than in that of the Lea, but inasmuch as many of the beds which
contained the implements found by him seem to bear but little relation
to existing watersheds, and are at no great distance from the Lea,
I shall at once proceed to the discussion of the remarkable series
of facts which he has brought to light. All details must, however,
be sought for in Mr. W. G. Smith’s own book, “Man, the Primeval
Savage.”[2608] |598|
The main source of the Lea is at Leagrave Marsh, about 3 miles N.W.
of Luton, and 376 feet above Ordnance datum. On the surface near this
place, Mr. Smith[2609] found a flat ovate implement, in form much like
those from Warren Hill or that from near Dunstable, Fig. 17. He says
that it may be neolithic, but that he has found palæolithic flakes,
both ochreous and grey, _in situ_ in gravel at Leagrave. At Houghton
Regis,[2610] 1 1∕2 miles north of Dunstable, Mr. Smith found a fragment
of an ovate implement on the surface. Another implement, found so long
ago as 1830 by Mr. William Gutteridge, at Dallow,[2611] or Dollar farm,
3∕4 of a mile west of Luton, is distinctly palæolithic in form.
The most interesting of Mr. Worthington Smith’s discoveries have,
however, been made on or near the summit of a hill, a good 2 miles
from the Lea, and somewhat nearer the Ver. At and around the village
of Caddington there are several brickfields, some of them no longer
worked. The original surface of the ground in some of these is as much
as 550[2612] to 595 feet above the Ordnance Datum. The brick-earth
is of great thickness, in places fully 50 feet, and overlies the
Chalk. The upper portion of the beds is much contorted, and has in
it occasional seams of flint gravel or tenacious clay, in which
cream-coloured or brownish palæolithic implements occur. In the gravel,
brown, ochreous, slightly abraded implements and flakes are found,
and at the base in many cases is the old land-surface or “Palæolithic
floor” resting on and surmounted by brick-earth. In one pit were three
heaps of flints brought by hand in Palæolithic times from flint-bearing
beds either above or in the Chalk. On the Palæolithic floor were
numerous sharp-edged flakes, which had hardly been moved from the
original place at which they were struck off. Mr. Smith has replaced
more than 500 flakes either on to other flakes or on to implements and
cores from the same floor.
One old land-surface was full of narrow vertical fissures, due perhaps
to the heat of a burning summer sun. While they were still open 18
inches of watery brick-earth, perhaps brought down by a heavy storm of
rain, filled up the fissures, covered up the old surface and formed
a new surface at a higher level. The upper deposits often resemble
contorted masses of half-frozen mud and stone pushed over an old
water-laid and perhaps frozen surface of brick-earth. Mr. Smith’s view
is that Palæolithic |599| man lived here by the side of one or more
small freshwater lakes, and manufactured his implements upon the spot
which eventually, by successive storms and flooding, became buried
beneath accumulations of mud. The neighbouring valley on the west was
not at that time excavated to its present depth. He considers that
the ochreous implements found at Caddington are of earlier date than
those of lighter colour found on the Palæolithic floor, and points
out that there is, moreover, a difference in the nature of the tools,
inasmuch as some well-formed scrapers occur in the brick-earth of the
Palæolithic floor, while they are never found amongst the ochreous
tools. The difference seems consistent with the probability that the
tools for domestic use would be more abundant on the spot where the men
of the period were at home than elsewhere. One of the most interesting
features of the case is the number of instances in which Mr. Smith
has been able to bring together the fragments of implements broken in
Palæolithic times,[2613] and to replace upon them the flakes removed
during the process of their manufacture. Of these he has given a long
series of illustrations in his book;[2614] those relating to one
instance are here by his kindness reproduced as Figs. 455A, B, and C.
[Illustration: Fig. 455A.—Caddington. 1∕2]
[Illustration: Fig. 455B.—Caddington. 1∕2]
In Fig. 455A is shown a finished implement broken in Palæolithic times,
both pieces found separately and now conjoined. Fig. 455B shows the
other side of the implement, with three of the flakes struck off during
its manufacture replaced, and Fig. 455C reproduces the first view, but
shows a fourth flake replaced. |600|
A good series of these reconstructed implements is in the British
Museum.
Fig. 455D shows an ovate implement from the brown stony clay at
Caddington. Fig. 455E represents a scraper, and Fig. 455F a pointed
tool from the Palæolithic floor, and an ivory-white sharp-edged
implement from the same source is illustrated in Fig. 455G. For all
these figures,[2615] I am indebted to Mr. Worthington Smith, as well as
for very many acts of kindness.
A paper by Mr. Smith on Neolithic and Palæolithic scrapers, re-placed
and re-worked, will be found in the _Essex Naturalist_.[2616]
[Illustration: Fig. 455C.—Caddington. 1∕2]
[Illustration: Fig. 455D.—Caddington. 1∕2]
At Mount Pleasant,[2617] Kensworth, to the west, on the other side of
the extension northwards of the valley, and at a height of 760 feet
above Ordnance datum, or nearly 200 feet higher than the Caddington
deposits, Mr. Worthington Smith has found |601| some ochreous flint
flakes, apparently of Palæolithic age, one of them trimmed.
[Illustration: Fig. 455E.—Caddington. 1∕2]
[Illustration: Fig. 455F.—Caddington. 1∕2]
At Harpenden, 8 1∕2 miles from the source of the Lea, and not far from
the stream, he has obtained a few ochreous palæolithic flakes. At
Wheathampstead, a few miles further down the Lea, he also met with a
few ochreous flakes in gravel near the railway station.
[Illustration: Fig. 455G.—Caddington. 1∕2]
[Illustration: Fig. 455H.—Wheathampstead. 1∕2]
In gravel brought from No Man’s Land, a common about a mile south
of Wheathampstead, the late Rev. Dr. Griffiths, of Sandridge, found
two small ovate implements of whitened flint,[2618] one of which he
presented to my collection. Mr. Worthington Smith, on visiting the spot
in 1886, discovered a rude implement of nearly the same character _in
situ_ in the gravel, and has lent me the block,[2619] Fig. 455H, on
which it is represented. He subsequently found an implement with only
one edge and the point |602| chipped into shape, also _in situ_. He
likewise discovered a third implement and a well-formed scraper in the
beds. The gravel at No Man’s Land is in a valley along which in former
times the Lea or a branch of its stream may have taken its course.
Near Ayot St. Peter[2620] and Welwyn, in the valley of the Maran, Mr.
Worthington Smith has found flakes only. I have recorded the finding of
an implement at North Mimms,[2621] south of Hatfield.
At and near Hertford and Ware, the Lea receives several other affluents
coming from the north. Among these is the Beane, the present source
of which is near Stevenage. At Fisher’s Green,[2622] a little to
the north of that town, pointed ochreous implements have been found
in the brick-earth by Mr. Frank Latchmore and myself. I have also a
rough ovate specimen made from a large broad flake, and found in a
brick-field south of Stevenage. Further south, in gravels exposed in
a cutting of the Great Northern Railway near Knebworth,[2623] some
well-formed implements, both pointed and ovate, were found in 1887.
I have several specimens, as well as an ovate implement found on the
surface in 1890. Still farther south, in a clay-pipe near Welwyn
Tunnel, a pointed ochreous implement (4 inches) was obtained in 1896,
which Mr. Frank Latchmore has kindly added to my collection.
Palæolithic implements have been found by Mr. Worthington Smith in
the gravels of the Lea[2624] and Beane at Hertford and Ware, one of
them at Bengeo. They are of pointed forms, fairly well made, and much
water-worn. He has recorded other implement-bearing gravels a mile
north-west of Ware and at Amwell. General Pitt Rivers has a remarkably
fine palæolithic implement, which is said to have been found at
Bayford, a mile or so south-west of Hertford.
In the valley of the Stort, which joins the Lea near Hoddesdon, two
palæolithic implements have been found by Mr. W. H. Penning, F.G.S.,
in the neighbourhood of Bishop’s Stortford. Though in both instances
lying on the surface, yet the condition of the implements is such that
there can be no doubt as to their having been but recently dug out of
the soil; the colour of both is a dark brown, ochreous in places, and
the general appearance |603| much like that of the implements found in
the brick-earth at Hoxne. One of them was found at a short distance
from the river, by the side of a ditch cut in a thin deposit of valley
brick-earth, about a mile north of Bishop’s Stortford, and probably had
been thrown out with the soil from the ditch. It is 5 1∕2 inches long
and 3 3∕4 inches broad, and in form it much resembles Fig. 421. The
other is of the same character, but is somewhat broader, and is squarer
at the base. It was found farther north, on the sandy surface of a
ploughed field, close to Pesterford Bridge.
In 1872 Mr. Penning also found, near Stocking Pelham, five miles north
of Bishop’s Stortford, an ochreous, somewhat water-worn, oval implement
5 inches in length.
At Flamstead End,[2625] one mile west of Cheshunt, and on the right
side of the Lea, Mr. Worthington Smith has obtained several implements
in the gravels, some of which he has kindly added to my collection.
He has also found specimens at Bush Hill Park and Forty Hill, near
Enfield; Rowan Tree Farm, Lower Edmonton, and between Edmonton and
Winchmore Hill. For his discoveries on the east or left side of the
Lea I must refer the reader to Mr. Smith’s book, “Man, the Primeval
Savage.” Suffice it to say that he has found implements in Drift
deposits at Plaistow,[2626] Stratford, Leyton, Leytonstone, Wanstead,
Walthamstow, Higham Hill, West Ham, Forest Gate, and Upton. In the
valley of the Roding he has added Barking, East Ham, and Ilford, and
farther east again Rainham, Gray’s Thurrock, Little Thurrock, Tilbury,
Mucking, Orsett, and Southend.
Mr. Hazzeldine Warren, of the Cedars, Waltham Cross, has obtained
several palæolithic implements from gravels at Bull’s Cross and Bush
Hill Park, Enfield, and a few at Hoddesdon. A fine pointed specimen (7
inches) from Bull’s Cross is rather like Fig. 459, but is battered at
the butt.
From gravel at Grove Green Lane, Leyton,[2627] some good pointed
implements have been obtained by Mr. A. P. Wire. One of them is 6
inches long.
A thin ovate implement made from a piece of tabular flint was found in
gravel at Lake’s Farm,[2628] Cannhall Lane, Wanstead.
A sub-triangular implement with a heavy butt was found in gravel of the
Roding Valley at St. Swithin’s Farm,[2629] Barking |604| Side, and two
others at Wallend, one mile west of Barking town. Mr. G. F. Lawrence
found an oval implement _in situ_ at Stratford.[2630] I have a rude
specimen found at Shoeburyness by Mr. B. Harrison.
Returning to London we must notice some discoveries on the southern
side of the Thames.
In 1872[2631] General Pitt Rivers recorded the finding of a palæolithic
implement and a flake in gravel on Battersea Rise, at the junction
of Grayshot Road and the Wandsworth Road; and in an excavation for a
new house on Battersea Rise,[2632] near Clapham Common, on one of the
higher gravel-terraces of the Thames, Mr. Worthington Smith picked up a
palæolithic implement in 1882.
Mr. G. F. Lawrence has also found two or three implements in gravel at
East and West Hill, Wandsworth, on each side of the Wandle, as well as
at Earlsfield. One from the latter place, now broken, must originally
have been of very large size. This and another are pointed. He has also
found one at Lavender Hill, and a small ovate specimen at Roehampton.
At Lewisham also an implement has been discovered. One of ovate form (4
inches) was found in 1874 in gravel on Wickham Road by Mr. A. L. Lewis,
and by him liberally added to my collection.
Further south, in a branch of the valley of the Ravensbourne, on a
patch of gravel upwards of 300 feet above Ordnance Datum, Mr. George
Clinch,[2633] in 1880, found several ovate palæolithic implements, and
in subsequent years many more; in all some fifty[2634] in number.
About four miles farther east, at Green Street Green,[2635] about 250
feet above Ordnance Datum, Mr. H. G. Norman found two palæolithic
implements, on the surface of what is now a dry part of the valley of
the river Cray, about two miles above its present source. They are both
of ovate form, one much like Fig. 420, the other like Fig. 468. Each
is about 5 1∕2 inches in length. “The gravel at this spot has afforded
remains not only of the mammoth, but also of the musk-ox.” |605|
Mr. de B. Crawshay[2636] has also found about 40 ovoid and pointed
palæolithic implements near Green Street Green.
The valley may be traced upwards for nearly five miles, in a
south-easterly direction, to Currie Wood, between Knockholt and
Shoreham; and on the border of this wood, not far from Currie Farm,
I found on the surface of the ground, in 1869, a well-marked flint
implement, in character and size closely resembling that from
Swalecliffe, Fig. 462, and stained of a rich ochreous colour. In
places there are some ferruginous concretions adhering to the surface,
and it has all the appearance of having been derived from the gravel
which here not unusually forms the superficial deposit. A part of one
of the faces has been lost owing to a recent fracture, and it can be
seen that the implement has been formed of what is now a light buff,
somewhat chalcedonic, flint, similar in character to that of most of
the pebbles in the gravel at Well Hill, near Chelsfield, about midway
between Currie Wood and Green Street Green. A subsequent search on the
spot, in company with Sir John Lubbock, Sir Joseph Prestwich, General
Pitt Rivers, and Sir Wollaston Franks, was unproductive of any more
specimens. The remarkable feature in the case is the elevation at which
this implement was found, the level of the ground being probably 300
feet above the neighbouring valley of the Darent, and upwards of 500
feet above the sea. Regarding the gravel, however, as connected with
the valley of the Cray, and not with that of the Darent, its elevation
above the head of the valley is but slight. In 1872 I remarked that
it was “necessary that further discoveries should be made in this
district, before it will be safe to speculate on the origin of these
gravels, and their relation to the superficial configuration of the
neighbourhood.” Since then, as will be seen in subsequent pages, these
discoveries have been made.
Farther down the valley of the Cray than Green Street Green, near
Dartford Heath, about half a mile to the south of Crayford Station, Mr.
Flaxman C. J. Spurrell, F.G.S., has been so fortunate as to discover,
_in situ_, the beautifully symmetrical implement which, through his
kindness, I am enabled to engrave as Fig. 456.
* * * * *
It is of dark, brownish grey flint, in places mottled with white. It is
worked to an edge all round, but is less sharp towards the base than
towards the point. On one side, near the point, the edge |606| has
been worn away by use into a curved notch. On the opposite side is a
more modern break. It is almost equally convex on the two faces.
Mr. Spurrell informs me that he found this implement lying on its face,
at a depth of 8 feet below the surface of the gravel, which is that of
the upper level of Dartford Heath, and appears to belong to the valley
of the Thames, and not to that of either the Cray or the Dart.
* * * * *
Another implement has been found near the same spot by Mr. C. C. S.
Fooks.[2637] A little to the north of Crayford, in the brick-earth
below an old cliff of chalk and Thanet sands, Mr. Spurrell has found a
number of flakes of flint associated with remains of the Pleistocene
fauna. He has, indeed, discovered a “Palæolithic floor” on which the
ancient workmen lived while they fashioned their tools. Not many of the
larger implements were found, but many of the flakes after having been
struck off the nucleus had been trimmed at the butt-end. By patience
and skill Mr. Spurrell was able to bring many of the flakes together
into their original positions, and thus to reconstitute the blocks of
flint from which they had been manufactured.[2638] In one instance
he was able to build up around an implement—broken in old times—the
various flakes struck off during its manufacture, and thus to reproduce
the block of flint originally taken in hand by the workman. Two
hammer-stones were present, made from cylindrical nodules of flint.
[Illustration: Fig. 456.—Dartford Heath. 1∕2]
It is to be remembered that in April,[2639] 1872, the Rev. O. Fisher,
F.G.S., found a worked flint, or flake, in Slade’s Green Pit, Crayford,
beneath a sandy stratum containing among other shells those of
_Corbicula fluminalis_. In 1875 a large broad flake (5 1∕2 inches) was
picked up by Dr. J. H. Gladstone, F.R.S.,[2640] in a |607| brick-earth
pit at Erith. It is figured and described in the _Argonaut_.[2641]
Another flake found in 1876 in the same stratum as that in which ten
years earlier a skull of a musk ox occurred, has been figured by
Professor Boyd Dawkins.[2642]
The fauna of the Crayford beds is remarkable, and comprises two Arctic
forms, _Oribos moschatus_ and a _Spermophilus_, as well as _Megaceros
hibernicus_, _Rhinoceros megarhinus_, _tichorhinus_ and _leptorhinus_,
_Elephas primigenius_ and _antiquus_, lion, hyæna, bear, and bison.
Professor Boyd Dawkins regards it as Mid-Pleistocene.[2643]
Before proceeding to discuss the discoveries that have been made in and
near the valley of the Darent, it will be well to follow the course of
the Thames a little farther eastward, and record those that have been
made in the neighbourhood of Northfleet, opposite Gray’s Thurrock. At
several places within about a mile of Northfleet Station, and to the
west of it, especially at Swanscombe, Milton Street, and Galley Hill,
gravel has been dug in considerable quantities, and has proved to
contain a very large number of palæolithic implements of various forms,
among which the pointed type is most abundant. At Milton Street[2644]
the surface level is about 100 feet above the Thames, and at Galley
Hill[2645] about 90 feet. It was in this pit, apparently at a depth
of about 8 feet from the top of the gravel, that a human skull, or
to judge from the presence of both _tibiæ_, a whole skeleton, was
discovered in September, 1888. No formal account of the discovery was
given until nearly seven years afterwards, when Mr. E. T. Newton,
F.R.S., communicated a detailed notice of the skull and limb-bones
to the Geological Society.[2646] I was present at the meeting, but
it appeared to me that the evidence as to the contemporaneity of the
bones with the containing beds was hardly convincing, and I ventured to
assume an attitude of doubt with regard to the discovery which I still
maintain. There can, however, be no question as to the true palæolithic
character of the implements found in the gravels, of which a few are
figured in illustration of Mr. Newton’s paper.[2647]
Leaving the Thames we come to the valley of the Darent, in which, about
a mile E.S.E.[2648] of Horton Kirby, Mr. W. Whitaker, F.R.S., in 1861,
found upon the surface, on the top of a hill, a |608| small ovate
implement about 3 1∕2 inches long, and in form much like Fig. 468.
At Lullingstone,[2649] at an elevation of 400 feet, another implement
has been found, and a pointed specimen of the Amiens type was picked
up by Miss H. Waring on Cockerhurst Farm,[2650] near Shoreham, at the
level of about 430 feet.
I now come to the numerous and important discoveries made during the
last thirty years by Mr. Benjamin Harrison,[2651] of Ightham, which,
aided by Sir Joseph Prestwich’s interpretation of them, have done
much to revolutionize our ideas as to the age and character of the
Drift deposits capping the Chalk Downs in Western Kent, north of the
escarpment facing the Weald.
All around Ightham, at different elevations above the bottom of the
neighbouring valley of the Shode, Mr. Harrison has succeeded in
discovering palæolithic implements of flint, for the most part of oval
or ovate forms, but not unfrequently pointed. Fane Hill, Bewley, Chart
Farm, Stone Pit Farm, Stone Street, Seal and Ash to the North may be
mentioned among the localities where his search was successful. He has
also found nearly fifty implements in the talus of Oldbury Hill.[2652]
Some of those from Seal occurred at a height of 420 feet above Ordnance
Datum, and on what appeared to be the watershed between the Medway and
the Darent. An almost circular specimen formed of ochreous flint and
found at Bewley, Ightham, is shown in Fig. 456A.
For full particulars of the localities and their relative levels,
the reader must be referred to Sir Joseph Prestwich’s comprehensive
paper[2653] on the occurrence of palæolithic flint implements in
the neighbourhood of Ightham, Kent, in which about forty places are
mentioned. Since that paper was published, Mr. Harrison, aided by
Mr. de B. Crawshay, has extended his researches with the result that
many more implements have been found at high elevations to the north
of the escarpment of the chalk. These discoveries enabled Sir Joseph
Prestwich in another paper[2654] on the Age, Formation and successive
Drift-stages of the valley of the Darent, and on the origin of its
chalk escarpment, still farther to extend his interesting speculations.
It is true that he accepts as being |609| of human manufacture, flints
with bruised and battered edges, which I and some others venture to
regard as owing their shape to purely natural causes. But fortunately
this does not invalidate his arguments, as in most cases where the
so-called “Plateau types” have been found, more or less well-finished
palæolithic implements of recognized form, though much abraded and
deeply stained, have also been discovered. The evidence of such
witnesses is not impaired by calling in that of others of more doubtful
character.
[Illustration: Fig. 456A.—Bewley, Ightham. 1∕2]
The continuous slope now extending from the neighbourhood of the Thames
to the summit of the Chalk escarpment, and in many places capped with
implementiferous drift, appears to have been continued southward within
the human period over a part of what is now the Lower Greensand area,
if not, indeed, into that of the Weald; and subsequently the great
valley that now intervenes between the Lower Greensand escarpment and
the North Downs must have been excavated.
Whatever causes we may assign for the changes in the
surface-configuration of the district, it must be borne in on all
that the time required to effect them is beyond all ordinary means of
calculation.
West of Ightham, at the head of the present valley of the Darent, is
Limpsfield,[2655] the scene of some interesting discoveries |610| made
by Mr. A. Montgomerie Bell. These, also, have been discussed by Sir
Joseph Prestwich in his paper on the Drift-stages of the Darent valley,
already mentioned; but for the following account of the locality I am
in the main indebted to Mr. Bell. Palæolithic implements have been
found by him and others in the parish of Limpsfield, Surrey, from the
year 1883 up to the present time. They are of the usual forms, both
pointed and oval, symmetrical and well made, though rarely exceeding
4 1∕2 inches in length. Many of them have been found on the surface of
the ground; but in a gravel-pit on the water-shed between the Darent
and the Medway, at an elevation of 500 feet above the sea, Mr. Bell
has succeeded in obtaining several implements out of the solid bed of
gravel, at depths of from 3 to 7 feet from the surface. The gravel is
about 8 feet in thickness and covers a considerable area. The late Mr.
Topley[2656] has pointed out that it presents some features that are
unusual in river gravels, and Mr. Bell is inclined to invoke some kind
of ice-action in its formation. I content myself with recording these
opinions.
Besides the gravel there is a second implementiferous deposit at
Limpsfield, on the slope of the Lower Greensand escarpment. Here more
than three hundred implements have been found, at elevations of from
450 to 570 feet above the sea, principally on the surface, but also in
the brick-earth at a depth of from 3 1∕2 to 5 feet. They have been most
frequent on Ridland’s Farm, and comprise all the forms that are usually
obtained.
Eastward of Ightham, within the watershed of the Medway, implements
from the gravels have been obtained at West Malling.[2657]
Dr. C. Le Neve Foster, F.R.S., in 1865, picked up a broken ovate
implement about a quarter of a mile S.W. of Marden Church, on the edge
of the valley of the Teise, an affluent of the Medway. Though found
on the surface, it is of an ochreous colour, and apparently has been
derived from some bed of gravel. In the same year, in the valley of
the Medway itself, at Sandling, he found a rude, almost circular,
implement, which, though on the surface, was also ochreous.
The most important discoveries, however, have been made in the
well-known pits near Aylesford, in which some very fine implements
have been found. I have several, one of which, of pointed form, with
a heavy butt, must originally have been 9 inches long. |611| It has,
however, had the end broken off. Mr. B. Harrison has given me another
thinner and more perfect pointed specimen made from a flat block of
flint. Numerous remains of the pleistocene fauna have been found in the
gravels.
In 1862, Prof. T. McK. Hughes, F.R.S., found a rude palæolithic
implement near Otterham Quay, Chatham, and another at Gillingham, in
the same neighbourhood. He also picked up a small oval implement at
Tweedale, half-way between Chatham and Upchurch; and one of larger
size, 5 inches long, with a rounded point and truncated base, on the
railway, west of Newington Station. Prof. Hughes likewise found a
rudely-chipped implement in gravel said to have been brought from a
pit near the railway-cutting at Hartlip. There may be some question
whether the gravels at these latter places would be more properly
classed as belonging to the valley of the Thames, or to that of the
Medway. On the north of the Medway, at St. Mary, in the hundred of
Hoo, Mr. W. Whitaker, F.R.S., found a small, neatly-chipped, pointed
implement; and another at Stoke, in the same district, with rounded
point, and sub-triangular in form. They are both ochreous in colour,
and have their angles much abraded. To the south of Gravesend, at some
distance from either the Medway or the Thames, near Meopham, Nursted,
and Cobham, he has also found broken implements of palæolithic types.
In the Christy Collection is an ovate implement, 4 1∕4 inches long, in
form like Fig. 462, which was discovered by Mr. E. A. Bernays on a heap
of gravel at Chatham.
I have also an ovate implement found in gravel at the Engineering
School, Chatham, in 1882, by Prof. J. W. Judd, F.R.S., who presented
it to me; as well as a good pointed implement found at Chatham by Mr.
Worthington Smith.
Farther east, Prof. Hughes found a large implement, which, though
wanting its point, is 8 inches long, in gravel said to have been
brought from a pit on the hill north of the railway, and half a mile
east of Teynham Station; and at Ospringe, near Faversham, Prof. W. Boyd
Dawkins found, in 1865, not in gravel, but on the surface, a small,
neatly-chipped, ovate implement. In form it resembles Fig. 467, from
the Isle of Wight, but is white and porcellanous. I have another fine
specimen, from the brick-earth at Faversham, which was given to me by
Mr. J. W. Morris of that town. It is 5 inches long, in form much like
Fig. 456, but thinner, and it has weathered to a porcellanous white on
|612| one face, and to a light grey on the other. South of Faversham,
at Moldash, Mr. C. E. Hawkins, of the Geological Survey, in 1872 came
across a smaller and thicker porcellanous ovate implement lying on
the surface of the ground. In the same district, 1 1∕2 miles south
of Selling Church, Mr. W. Whitaker, F.R.S., has found another small
pointed implement of palæolithic character. |613|
[Illustration: Fig. 457.—Reculver. 1∕1]
It is, however, in the neighbourhood of Herne Bay and Reculver, that
palæolithic implements have been found in the greatest number. The
first discoveries in that locality were made in the autumn of 1860
by Mr. Thomas Leech,[2658] who had studied in the School of Mines,
in Jermyn Street, and who, while searching for fossil remains at the
base of the cliff between Herne Bay and Reculver, picked up a flint
implement which he at once recognized as analogous in form with some
of those from the River-drift of the valley of the Somme. Continuing
his search, he found six implements in all, which he placed in the
Museum of Economic Geology, in Jermyn Street. One of those is shown
full size in Fig. 457, from a block which has already been used in the
_Archæologia_. It is of considerable interest, as having been formed
from a Lower Tertiary flint pebble, and not from a flint derived
directly from the chalk. The rounded end of the pebble, which forms
the butt of the instrument, is admirably adapted for being held in the
hand. It is singularly like the implement from St. Acheul, shown in Pl.
I., Fig. 9.
* * * * *
On being informed of this discovery, the late Sir Joseph Prestwich
and I at once visited the locality. I have also been there on many
subsequent occasions. The implements in this case have not been found
in their original matrix, but exposed upon the sea-shore at the base of
the cliff, between Herne Bay and Reculver, and for the most part at a
short distance from the Bishopstone Coast-guard Station. In all, there
must have been upwards of a hundred discovered. I have myself found at
various times eight specimens. Sir Joseph Prestwich,[2659] Mr. James
Wyatt, Mr. Whitaker, and others, have also found some. The greatest
number, however, have either been found by or passed into the hands of
the late Mr. John Brent,[2660] F.S.A., of Canterbury, who has supplied
a series of twelve or fourteen to the Christy Collection.
A magnificent implement was found near Bishopstone about 1891, and
has been brought under my notice by Col. A. J. Copeland, F.S.A. It is
rather more pointed than Fig. 472, and is 11 inches long and nearly 6
inches wide towards the base. It rivals in size that from Shrub Hill,
mentioned on p. 569.
The majority of the specimens seem to be of the pointed form, of which
the implement engraved full size in Fig. 458 offers a fine example.
It was found by myself in 1861, and has already been figured in the
_Archæologia_,[2661] as has also Fig. 459, the original of which was
found by Sir Joseph Prestwich.
[Illustration: Fig. 458.—Near Reculver. 1∕1]
[Illustration: Fig. 459.—Near Reculver. 1∕1]
A small, but rather curious implement from Mr. Brent’s collection |616|
is shown in Fig. 460. It is slightly curved in the direction of its
length, and has a remarkably thick butt. The original of Fig. 461 is
in the Christy Collection, and has been made from a broad flake, which
has subsequently been chipped into an oval form. Its surface is much
altered in structure, and has become mottled and ochreous. In general
character this instrument much resembles the large broad flakes from
the gravel at Montiers, near Amiens, but it has been chipped to a more
symmetrical outline than that which they usually present. Another,
of much the same form, has been found by Mr. Brent, in the gravel at
Canterbury. An engraving of another pointed implement from Reculver is
given in _Once a Week_.[2662] A few specimens have been found of oval
or ovate, and of sub-triangular form, and equally convex on both faces.
[Illustration: Fig. 460.—Reculver. 1∕2]
Thanks to Mr. F. Rutley, F.G.S., I have a small ochreous oval
implement, which he found on the shore 1 1∕2 miles west of Reculver.
[Illustration: Fig. 461.—Reculver. 1∕2]
Though the implements are usually found on the sea-shore at the foot
of the cliff, there can be no doubt of their being derived from the
gravels at its summit. They are generally somewhat worn by the action
of the waves, but occasionally they have preserved their edges quite
sharp, and their angles unabraded, so that they could not have been
many days upon the shore, and must have been quite recently derived
from the cliff. I have, indeed, been informed by a coastguard-man that
in |617| 1884 he found an implement _in situ_ in the gravel on the
cliff somewhat west of Old Haven Gap. Many of them are stained of the
same ochreous colour as the other flints in the gravel, and I have,
moreover, in one instance, found the point of an implement on the
surface a short distance inland. Dr. G. D. Gibb, F.G.S.,[2663] also
records finding a broken implement on the top of the cliff, half-way
between Herne Bay and Reculver. The late Mr. Brent, F.S.A., had a long
flake stained of an ochreous colour, and apparently derived from the
gravel, which also came from the top of the cliff.
The lower part of the cliff, of which a section has been published by
Sir Joseph Prestwich,[2664] consists of Thanet Sands and the sandy beds
of the Woolwich Series, above which is a local pebbly clay deposit of
small extent, and about 8 feet thick, to which he is inclined to refer
the flint implements. Its height is about 50 feet above the sea. At a
higher level farther west, near Old Haven Gap, are other gravel beds,
which he presumes to be of older date. Into this question I need not
enter, but for further geological details will refer the reader to my
account of this discovery in the _Archæologia_.[2665]
There are pits, in which gravel is dug, near Chislet, where not
improbably similar implements will eventually be discovered. I may add
that it is difficult to form an idea of the position of the coast-line
at the time when these gravels, which appear to be of freshwater
origin, were deposited; as, owing to the soft nature of the base of the
cliffs, the gain of the sea upon the land has been very rapid in this
district, for even since Leland’s time—say three and a half centuries
ago—it has encroached nearly a mile,[2666] but to this subject I shall
have to recur.
To the west of Herne Bay, and about midway between that place and
Whitstable, is another cliff, near Studhill, where, in the gravel which
caps it, 50 feet above the sea, I have found a portion of a molar of
_Elephas primigenius_, and at the foot of the cliff, rather farther
to the west, the implement shown full size in Fig. 462.[2667] It is
stained of an ochreous colour to some depth, and its surface is much
altered in structure. Sir Joseph Prestwich[2668] seems inclined to
refer this implement to a stratum of clay and gravelly sand at a lower
level, but its colour is more in accordance with the higher beds. I
subsequently picked up another implement of sub-triangular form, deeply
stained, and much waterworn at the edges, at the foot of the same
cliff. Tusks and bones of _Elephas primigenius_,[2669] are stated to be
found near this spot when the cliff falls, as is frequently the case,
from its being undermined by the sea. Elephants’ teeth are occasionally
dredged up off the shore, and I have seen one which was found on the
shore at Reculver.
At Swalecliffe, nearer Whitstable, where, in the shingle, an
ochreously-stained flint flake was found by my son, and again, nearer
Herne Bay, at Hampton, there are more argillaceous freshwater beds at a
lower level, and containing land and marsh shells; but these seem to be
comparatively modern, and connected with small lateral valleys rather
than with the main valley of the Thames, or of any other ancient river.
|618|
Immediately east of Reculver lies the marshy valley which separates
the Isle of Thanet from the rest of Kent, a valley which is traversed
by the river Stour, the principal stream of which passes by Sandwich,
eastward, while a smaller channel connects it with a small stream
rising to the west of Chislet, and conducts part of its waters
northward to Northmouth sluice. The Stour and its tributaries drain an
area of upwards of 300 square miles, and not far from its source at
Rowton Chapel, near Lenham, Mr. G. Bunyard, of Maidstone, found in 1885
a good ovate palæolithic implement of flint, while near Canterbury,
flint implements have been found in considerable numbers in the gravels
in the neighbourhood of the river.
[Illustration: Fig. 462.—Studhill. 1∕1]
[Illustration: Fig. 463.—Thanington. 1∕2]
Their discovery is due to the late Mr. John Brent, F.S.A., of
Canterbury, with whom I have visited the neighbourhood, and who has
most kindly furnished me with all the information at his command,
including some particulars of the levels, and has allowed me to |619|
engrave some of his specimens. One of the finest of these is shown in
Fig. 463. The flint of which it is composed has become porcellanous,
and nearly white. Small portions of the original crust are left at
the base, and on one of the faces; the point has been broken off in
ancient times. It was found in Thanington parish, on the surface, and
not in the gravel, from which, however, it was undoubtedly derived.
Several other specimens have been found in the same manner, among
stones gathered from the surface of the slope of the southern side of
the valley of the Stour, between Thanington and Canterbury. I have a
pointed implement, but unfortunately broken, which was found by the
late Mr. Frederick Pratt Barlow, on a heap of stones, when he visited
the spot with me in 1868. The gravel beds near Thanington, out of which
the implements appear to have come, must be from 80 to 100 feet above
the river. Nearer Canterbury, at the back of Wincheap, between the
waterworks and the gasometer, pits have been sunk in the gravel, at a
lower level, where the surface |620| of the ground is about 29 feet
above the river, from which the pits are distant about 600 yards; and
from this spot Mr. Brent has procured several well-wrought implements
of various forms. One of these is shown in Fig. 464.[2670] Its surface
is lustrous, and of an ochreous colour, and the central ridge is
waterworn.
[Illustration: Fig. 464.—Canterbury. 1∕2]
The gravel, which is about 12 feet in thickness, and rests on the
chalk, is coarse, and consists principally of sub-angular flints,
with an admixture of rounded chalk, sandstone and iron-stone pebbles,
with some fragments of fossil wood apparently from the Thanet Sands.
The matrix is sandy, and there are some sandy veins. In parts of the
pit there is a great thickness of brick-earth or loam. No land or
freshwater shells have as yet been found, but some mammalian remains
have occurred, among which is a molar of _Elephas primigenius_. At a
lower level, in the gravel exposed by drainage works along Wincheap, I
found several flakes; and more recently, in 1870, Mr. Brent has kindly
sent me two pointed implements found in gravel in a pit near the new
gasometer, where the surface is lower than that near the waterworks by
5 or 6 feet. One is of much the same type as the Reculver specimen,
Fig. 458, but of coarser workmanship, and about 6 inches long. The
other is less symmetrical, and only 4 1∕2 inches in length. The surface
of each is very much bruised and waterworn, and deeply stained of a
dark ochreous colour.
There are in my collection numerous other specimens from Canterbury,
both pointed and ovate. Many of them are deeply stained and much
waterworn. One of these, by the kindness of Mr. Worthington Smith,
is shown in Fig. 464A.[2671] The white patches marked A show where
chips that have been detached before the implement was left in its
final position in the gravel have left an unabraded surface. Mr. Smith
regards this implement as one of the oldest class, and certainly it
appears to have met with many vicissitudes and to have travelled
a long way down the valley of the Stour before attaining its last
resting-place. Another specimen, from the New Cemetery, is sharp and
unabraded, and almost black and unstained. A fine pointed implement 7
inches long, has become white and porcellanous.
Higher up the valley, an implement has been found on the surface near
Chilham, by Mr. John Marten, formerly of Easinge. It was at a distance
of a quarter of a mile from the river, and at a height of about 100
feet above it.
Lower down, near Wear Farm, between Chislet and Reculver, on the
western bank of the North Channel of the Stour, is a pit with
sand and loam above the chalk, which has been described by |621|
Prestwich.[2672] In the lower beds of sand, at a height of but a
few feet above the sea, he found freshwater shells (including the
_Corbicula fluminalis_), mammalian remains, and valves of the marine
shell _Balanus_, as well as _Entomostraca_ and _Foraminifera_,
characteristic of brackish water conditions. It would appear that
we have here another instance of the occurrence of beds with the
_Corbicula_, at no great distance from those productive of flint
implements, but at a lower level. From a pit of the same character,
on the opposite side of the road, I have seen elephant remains in the
possession of Mr. Slater, of Grays, near Chislet.
[Illustration: Fig. 464A.—Canterbury. 1∕2]
Another palæolithic implement of ovate form was discovered in 1865,
on a heap of stones, about 3 miles north of Folkestone, by Mr. W.
Topley, F.R.S., of the Geological Survey. It is of course impossible
to say from what source it was derived; but it may be mentioned that
at Folkestone itself, at the top of the West Cliff, near the Battery,
at the height of 110 feet above low-water mark, are some beds of
Drift of much the same character as those in which flint implements
have occurred in other localities, containing remains of _Elephas
primigenius_, _Hippopotamus major_, and other mammals, and shells of
_Helix_.
Since this passage was written, a remarkably well-shaped ovate
implement has been found in St. John’s Road (Radnor Park end),
Folkestone, by Mr. Richard Kerr, F.G.S., in August, 1893. It lay in
brick-earth at a comparatively low level, and is of flint partially
whitened. With it was found a molar tooth of _Rhinoceros tichorhinus_.
It is now, through Mr. Kerr’s kindness, in my collection, and is
represented in Fig. 464B. |622|
Proceeding along the southern coast, the next discoveries that have to
be recorded are those made to the west of Eastbourne by Mr. R. Hilton.
At Bell’s Field, Friston, he has found ovate implements, both ochreous
and white and porcellanous, and he has given me a pointed implement
from Crow Link Gap, East Dean. Although found on the surface and not
in gravel or brick-earth, the implements present types which seem to
justify their being regarded as of Palæolithic age.
Farther west, in the so-called Elephant bed at Brighton, a bed
apparently of subaërial origin, and containing numerous mammalian
remains of the Pleistocene period, Mr. Ernest Willett, in 1876, found
a well-marked ovate implement, 5 1∕2 inches long, of the type shown in
Plate II., No. 11.
[Illustration: Fig. 464B.—Folkestone. 1∕2]
With these exceptions, if such they be, the valleys of the smaller
rivers along the southern coast of England have as yet been barren of
discoveries of implements in their gravels, until we come to the Itchen
and the Test, which unite below Southampton, and now discharge into
Southampton Water. As will be subsequently seen, there is good reason
for believing that at the time when these implements were in use, a
portion of the ground now covered by this estuary formed the bed of a
river, itself a branch of a larger stream, only a small part of the
course of which now remains, and that in a greatly altered condition,
having been widened out into the Solent and Spithead.
The localities at which palæolithic implements have been found in the
neighbourhood of the Itchen and Test are as yet mainly confined to the
lower part of their course, namely, near the town of Southampton and
along the shore of Southampton Water. The first discoveries in the
district were made in 1863,[2673] by Mr. James Brown, of Salisbury,
who found several implements in the neighbourhood of |623| Hill Head,
about nine miles S.E. of Southampton; while the earliest discoveries
near the latter place are of somewhat more recent date, and due to Mr.
W. Read, C.E., until lately a resident of Southampton.
[Illustration: Fig. 465.—Southampton. 1∕2]
I take the Southampton discoveries first, as being nearer the sources
of the rivers. The implements obtained by Mr. Read have come from
four different excavations in the gravel, at some distance from each
other, three of them on Southampton Common, all of which I have,
through his courtesy, had the opportunity of examining in his company,
and the other at Freemantle, to the west of the town, about 60 feet
above mean-tide level. The first of those on the Common was on the
southern side, close by the road leading to the cemetery, where a
section of gravel about 6 feet in thickness was exposed. This consisted
principally of sub-angular flints and Lower Tertiary flint-pebbles
mixed with a few of quartz, in a loose sandy matrix, and with some
sandy and marly seams in places. At the base of the gravel was found
the pointed implement shown in Fig. 465. It is stained of an ochreous
colour, and has a projection on one side, towards the base, like that
on the implement from Thetford, Fig. 427. One face is more carefully
chipped than the other, and the edges and angles are slightly |624|
water-worn. The elevation of the ground, at the spot where it was
found, is estimated to be 86 feet above the mean sea-level.[2674]
In another small pit, at a rather higher level, and close to the N.E.
corner of the cemetery, at a depth of 5 feet from the surface, an oval
implement was found by Mr. Read, _in situ_, in the gravel, which here
attains a thickness of about 8 feet. In this, as also in the preceding
case, a bed of brick-earth or loess has been removed from above the
gravel. The surface of this implement is ochreous and polished, and its
angles are waterworn. The periphery is much twisted, like that of Fig.
434 from Santon Downham.
At the N.W. corner of the Common, fully half a mile from the first pit,
and at a higher level still, where the surface of the ground is stated
to be more than 160 feet above the mean sea-level, was the extensive
excavation known as the Town Pit. The gravel here retains the same
character, but is perhaps rather less coarse; and above it is a thin
bed of marl, which separates it from the loess or brick-earth, which
in most places has been removed for use. The gravel itself attains a
thickness of from 8 to 15 feet, and from “a fall,” at about 6 feet from
the surface, was picked out an ovate implement 4 1∕2 inches in length,
and in form like Fig. 419 from Bury St. Edmunds. Its edges are sharp,
and its surface lustrous and stained of an ochreous tint, though on one
face the flint has become partially whitened.
Another and still more interesting specimen (5 1∕2 inches), which, like
that last described, is now, by the kindness of Mr. Read, in my own
collection, has also been found in this pit. It is irregularly oval in
form, being somewhat truncated at one end, but bearing a strong general
resemblance to that from Hill Head, Fig. 466. Its surface is lustrous
and deeply stained all over of a bright ochreous colour, and its angles
and edges are much waterworn. The significance of this fact, in the
case of an implement found in gravel capping a gently sloping tongue of
land, between two rivers, the levels of which are now 160 feet below
it, will be considered hereafter. Numerous other implements have been
found near Southampton, and extensive collections of them are in the
possession of Mr. W. E. Darwin and Mr. W. Dale. There is also a series
in the Hartley Institution at Southampton. Higher up the valleys of
the Itchen or the Test, none of the more highly-wrought implements
have as yet been found in the gravels, although it seems probable that
they may eventually be discovered, especially if the drift-beds at
some considerable height above the present river levels be excavated.
I have, however, seen a flake with one face artificial, and with signs
of use or wear at the edge, which was found in a gravel-pit near the
Fleming Arms, Swathling, a few miles north of Southampton, by Mr.
Spencer G. Perceval. In the gravel near this place a molar of _Elephas
primigenius_ is recorded to have been found.[2675]
I have also a deeply-stained ovate implement from Redbridge, close to
Southampton, found by Mr. Worthington G. Smith.
* * * * *
I have already, in 1864, described elsewhere[2676] the discoveries
which have been made in the gravels on the eastern shore of |625|
Southampton Water, in the neighbourhood of Hill Head. Since that time
a considerable number of flint instruments have been found in this
locality, principally by Mr. James Brown, the original discoverer, and
his friends.
[Illustration: Fig. 466.—Hill Head.]
* * * * *
A large number of specimens from this district are preserved in the
Blackmore Museum at Salisbury. Among them is at least one of chert.
Of those found near Hill Head, a large proportion are flat, oval, and
ovate specimens, one of which is engraved as Fig. 466. It was found
by Mr. James Brown, in 1863, on the shore between Brunage and Hill
Head. It is ochreous, and has its angles slightly waterworn, possibly
in modern times, by the action of the pebbles on the shore. Some of
the specimens have suffered considerably from this cause; but that the
implements are derived from the gravel is proved by the fact of one
having been discovered by Mr. James Brown,[2677] in a mass which had
fallen from the cliff. Some of the |626| implements are of the pointed
form with straight sides, and a few have the rounded butt of the flint
left untouched, apparently by way of handle. One or two well-chipped
broad flakes have also been found. The discoveries have extended over
about 9 miles of the coast between Warsash and Gosport. Along a great
part of this distance there is a low cliff, ranging in height from
about 20 to 38 feet[2678] above the mean sea-level, and consisting of
sands belonging to the Bracklesham series, capped by gravelly beds, in
many places 10 to 12 feet thick, and in some, as much as 15 or 16 feet.
These beds are almost continuous, and rest on a nearly horizontal base,
except where the cliff is intersected by transverse valleys. The gravel
consists almost entirely of chalk flints, mostly subangular, among
which are some of considerable size, and some quite fresh and unrolled.
There are also a few quartz and chert pebbles in the mass, and some
large blocks of sandstone of Tertiary origin. Some loamy and sandy beds
occur at intervals, but no mammalian remains or land or freshwater
shells have, I believe, as yet been found in these beds of Drift. The
gravels extend eastward a considerable distance, as may be seen on the
excellent map[2679] given by Mr. Codrington in illustration of his
paper on the Superficial Deposits of this District, as well as on the
new Geological Survey Map. Since his paper was written Mr. Codrington
has found _in situ_, in a gravel-pit at Warsash, a mile to the north of
Hook a well-wrought, long, pointed implement, at a height of about 46
feet above the mean sea-level. Two implements, one of them much like
Fig. 468, found on Southsea Common to the east of Portsmouth, by Lieut.
Oliver, R.E., and Mr. G. Smith, are now in the Blackmore Museum.
During building operations at Lee on the Solent,[2680] numerous
palæolithic implements have been found and preserved by Sir J. C.
Robinson, F.S.A., to whom I am indebted for several specimens.
On the other side of Spithead, at the Foreland or most eastern point
of the Isle of Wight, the cliff-section shows a bed of shingly gravel,
apparently a beach-deposit, according to Mr. Codrington, and between
30 and 40 feet thick, resting in a deep valley in the Bembridge marl.
Towards the edge, where the gravel would abut against the marl, it is
cut off by a trough filled with brick-earth 36 feet thick, with a few
seams of small angular flints. This brick-earth appears to extend some
distance upwards over the slope of the marl as well as over the shingly
gravel; and among some flints derived from it, at a height of about 80
feet above the mean sea-level, Mr. Codrington found the neatly-chipped
ovate implement shown in Fig. 467. Its surface is lustrous and in part
whitened, and its angles and edges are sharp and unworn. The possible
connection of the bed containing this instrument with others in this
district is a matter for future consideration.
The discovery is not, however, the only one that has been made in the
Isle of Wight. I have two ovate water-worn specimens, found on the
shore at Bembridge, and a thick, pointed implement, found on the beach
between the flag-staff at Bembridge Point and the ferry. Prof. E. B.
Poulton, F.R.S., has also found two implements on the shore at Seaview
between Ryde and Bembridge. |627|
I now turn to the discoveries made in the valleys of the Avon and its
affluents, which drain an area of about 670 square miles. The first
of these took place in the River-drift beds, in the neighbourhood
of Salisbury; beds which were pointed out by Sir Joseph Prestwich
in 1859[2681] as likely to contain implements of the same class as
those from the valley of the Somme. This prognostication was made in
ignorance of the fact that, already in 1846, a palæolithic implement
had been found near Salisbury, and had come into the possession of the
late Dr. S. P. Woodward, of the British Museum, who at that time put it
aside, as having little reference to his own special studies.
[Illustration: Fig. 467.—The Foreland, Isle of Wight. 1∕2]
In 1863, however, Dr. Humphrey P. Blackmore, of Salisbury, discovered
a flint implement in the gravel at Bemerton, near that town; and since
that time numerous other discoveries have been made by him in the
district, and also by the late Mr. E. T. Stevens, Mr. James Brown, and
other explorers resident at Salisbury, the results of whose zealous
researches may be seen in the admirable Blackmore Museum. These
discoveries have been made in the valleys of the Avon and the Wiley,
and also on the spur of land separating those streams, and on that
between the Avon and the Bourne. In the valley of the Avon, implements
have been found at Lake, about 6 miles above Salisbury; and also at
Ashford, near Fordingbridge, about 12 miles below its junction with
the Wiley and Nadder at that city. As Lake is the highest point in
the Valley of the Avon proper at which, up to the present time, such
discoveries have been made in the River-drift, it will be well to
notice it first, though it must be mentioned that Mr. F. J. Bennett, of
the Geological Survey, has found a good palæolithic implement farther
north, near Pewsey Station.
Implements were found at this spot, in 1865, by Mr. Tiffin, jun., of
|628| Salisbury,[2682] but only a few have since been discovered,
as the gravel is little, if at all, worked; and it is therefore only
on the slope of the hill where the beds have been cut through by the
deepening of the valley that they occur. That shown in Fig. 468 is
preserved in the Blackmore Museum. It is stained of an ochreous tint,
and is worn at its edges. Others of similar form, but white, have also
been found, as well as some large broad flakes. It is needless to
discuss the character of the gravel, as so many discoveries, of which
the circumstances can be better ascertained, have been made in the same
neighbourhood. In the valley of the Wiley, at South Newton, about 5
miles above Salisbury, an isolated specimen of a flat ovate implement
has also been found.
[Illustration: Fig. 468.—Lake. 1∕2]
Nearer Salisbury, at Bemerton and Fisherton, the discoveries have been
of more interest and importance. They have already, to some extent,
been described by myself,[2683] principally from information given me
by Dr. Humphrey P. Blackmore. The beds of Drift at these two places are
at different levels on the slope of the north side of the valley of
the Wiley, and of different characters; that at Bemerton being at the
higher level, and principally gravel, and that at Fisherton lower, and
principally consisting of brick-earth, with a few gravelly seams.
The pit at Bemerton, in which most of the implements have been found,
is about a mile west of Salisbury, nearly opposite the new church,
and close to the lane connecting the roads to Wilton and Devizes, and
nearly midway between them. The gravel consists mainly of subangular
flints, with a few Upper Greensand pebbles and Tertiary sandstone
blocks in a red clayey matrix. It is 10 to 12 feet |629| in thickness,
and attains a height of at least 100 feet above the river, though in
this particular pit it is only about 80 feet above it. The gravel caps
the hill, instead of lying merely in a trough along its side, so that
in this particular, the section I have elsewhere given is incorrect.
The chalk comes nearly to the surface, lower down the slope, and
divides the gravel from a brick-earth deposit continuous with that of
Fisherton, farther down the valley.
[Illustration: Fig. 469.—Bemerton. 1∕2]
The implements found at Bemerton are principally oval, ovate, and
ovate-lanceolate. They are for the most part considerably altered in
texture at the surface, and many of them are much rolled and waterworn.
A few flakes and spalls of flint have also been found. The original
of Fig. 469 is in the Blackmore Museum, and is of grey flint, not
waterworn. It shows some marks of use on the edge, towards the point,
and a portion of the natural crust of the flint remains at the base. In
all, upwards of twenty specimens have been found in this gravel, one
of them as high as the cemetery. Several others have also been found
between that place and Highfield, which is about a quarter of a mile
nearer Salisbury than the Bemerton Pit; and in gravel which there caps
the hill between the Wiley and the Avon, implements have also been
found.
[Illustration: Fig. 470.—Highfield. 1∕2]
A remarkably small specimen from this place is shown in Fig. 470. It is
of grey flint, slightly ochreous, and with its angles somewhat worn.
The original is in the Blackmore Museum. |630|
I am not aware of any organic remains having as yet been found in
these upper gravels, though they are abundant in the brick-earth at
a lower level, at Fisherton Anger, where, however, flint implements
are so scarce that only few have been found; two of these are in the
Blackmore Museum. One of them, obtained beneath remains of the mammoth,
in 1874,[2684] is shown in Fig. 471. The flint of which it is made has
become white and porcellanous, its angles are sharp, but along the
edges of both sides towards the base there are marks of wearing away by
use. The other specimen is only fragmentary, but the flint has assumed
the same characters. The edge is like that of Fig. 437; one face of the
implement having been flat and the section wedge-shaped.
[Illustration: Fig. 471.—Fisherton. 1∕2]
The Drift deposits at Fisherton have long been known to geologists,
and have been described by Sir Charles Lyell,[2685] Sir Joseph
Prestwich,[2686] and others. They present a great similarity to the
implement-bearing beds at Menchecourt, near Abbeville, as has been
pointed out by Sir Joseph Prestwich;[2687] and this circumstance led us
to visit the spot in 1859, with a view of discovering works of man in
the beds, though at that time our search was unrewarded.
It is needless for me here to describe the beds in detail: suffice it
to say, that resting on a more highly inclined surface of chalk is a
deposit, the upper portion of which forms the surface of the present
slope on the northern side of the valley of the united Wiley and
Nadder. It is in some places nearly 30 feet in thickness, but thins out
|631| towards the bottom of the valley. This deposit,[2688] leaving the
superficial soil out of the question, has usually in its upper part a
rubbly gravel, with angular and subangular flints, fragments of chert,
iron-stone, and chalk, mixed with clay and brick-earth, to a thickness
of 4 or 5 feet; below that is from 10 to 18 feet of brick-earth mixed
with variable masses of flint and chalk rubble, and containing bones
and shells, principally in its lower part; below this again, from 1 to
2 feet of fine marl, full of well-preserved shells and a few bones; and
at the base, flint and chalk rubble, with sand and clay.
The following species are recorded by Dr. Blackmore as having occurred
in these beds:—_Canis lupus_, _Canis vulpes_, _Hyæna spelæa_, _Felis
spelæa_, _Bison minor_,[2689] _Bos primigenius_, _Ovibos moschatus_,
_Cervus tarandus_, _Cervus_ (_Guettardi?_), _Cervus elaphus_, _Equus_
(four varieties), _Rhinoceros tichorinus_, _Elephas primigenius_,
_Spermophilus_ (_superciliosus?_), _Lemmus torquatus_, _Lemmus_
(_norvegicus?_), _Arvicola_ (_sp. nov.?_) and _Lepus timidus_.
Of birds, some bones of the wild goose, _Anser segetum_, have been
found, and portions of the shells of eggs corresponding to those of the
same bird, and of the wild duck, _Anas boscas_.
The land and freshwater shells consist of _Ancylus_, _Limnæa_,
_Planorbis_, _Bythinia_, _Valvata_, _Pisidium_, _Acme_, _Carychium_,
_Succinea_, _Helix_, _Limax_, _Pupa_, _Zonites_, and _Zua_.
It is worthy of notice in passing, that the presence of the musk ox,
the marmot, and the lemming, to say nothing of the reindeer, seems to
point to a colder climate having prevailed at the time of the deposit
of these beds, than now. The egg of the wild goose, if such it be, is
also suggestive of a more arctic climate; as the breeding-place of this
bird is presumably in the far north. This question of climate will come
under consideration farther on.
The discoveries at Milford Hill have already been placed on record
by Dr. H. P. Blackmore.[2690] This hill, the name of which has on
the old Ordnance Map been by error assigned to Cricket Down, forms a
spur between the valleys of the Avon and the Bourne, and is in fact a
continuation of Mizmaze Hill, from which, however, it is cut off by a
transverse valley about 30 feet in depth. The summit of the hill rises
to an elevation of about 100 feet above the waters of the Avon and the
Bourne, which flow on either side of it, and unite below the point of
the spur. At the summit of the hill the gravel attains its greatest
thickness, which is about 12 feet. It rests on an irregular surface of
chalk, occasionally running down into pipes, and thins out towards the
sides, ceasing altogether rather more than half way down the hill. In
places, there is chalk rubble or gravel in a chalky matrix at the base.
The gravel consists principally of subangular flints, a few Tertiary
pebbles, and blocks of sandstone, and contains a larger proportion of
Upper Greensand chert than the Bemerton gravel—the whole mixed with
a variable proportion of sand and stiff clay, and for the most part
deeply stained by iron. Many of the large flints are said to present
|632| no signs of wearing by water transport. On the slope of the
hill, near the base of the gravel, a narrow seam of sand was found to
contain some land shells of the genera _Helix_, _Pupa,_ and _Zua_. No
mammalian remains, with the exception of a tooth of horse, have been
found in the gravel.
Flint implements have been discovered here in considerable numbers,
mostly of the pointed lanceolate form; some of ovate, and other
forms, including a scraper, have also occurred. Most of them are
now in the Blackmore Museum. More than one specimen is of chert. In
about 150 yards of gravel, excavated to form a cellar at Elm Grove,
Milford Hill, no less than twenty implements of different forms were
found, principally by Mr. James Brown. Dr. Blackmore observes that
the implements on the side of the hill are relatively only half as
numerous as on the top, and that the condition of their surface varies
considerably, the majority being waterworn, but others having their
edges and angles as sharp as if they had been made yesterday. The
degree of staining also varies, and is not always due to their present
position in the gravel, some deeply stained having been dug out of the
chalk rubble at the base, where they lay side by side with fragments of
flint, which retained their original colour; and, on the other hand,
perfectly unstained specimens having been obtained from the ochreous
gravel. Several implements were observed, _in situ_, by Mr. Wheaton,
Mr. James Brown, and others; and they were found scattered unevenly
through the deposit, but the majority low down and towards the base.
Many of them are extremely rude; in fact, as a whole, “ruder and less
skilfully made than most of the specimens from the valley of the
Somme.” Flakes and spalls were found in considerable numbers, and also
a few remarkably well-made implements, of which a magnificent specimen
is shown in Fig. 472. It is of light-grey flint, with the natural
crust on part of the base. The face not shown is roughly chipped, but
it has been neatly wrought at the edge to a symmetrical form. Its
angles are but slightly rounded. A detailed account of the discoveries
at Bemerton[2691] and Milford Hill, with maps and figures of several
implements, has been given by Mr. C. J. Read, of Salisbury.
A scraper-like implement from Britford, a short distance below
Salisbury, is in the Blackmore Museum.
About 6 miles below Salisbury, in gravel, near Downton,[2692] and at an
elevation of about 150 feet above the river Avon, Sir Joseph Prestwich
picked up a small ovate implement, in form like Fig. 456, but more
sharply pointed and only 3 inches in length. Between the pit, in which
it was found, and the river, two gravel-terraces occur, one 80 to
110 feet, and the other 40 to 60 feet, above its level. At Breamore,
farther south, a well-shaped pointed implement of chert was found by
Mr. E. Westlake in 1888, in gravels 100 feet above the Avon.
[Illustration: Fig. 472.—Milford Hill, Salisbury. 1∕2]
A few miles farther down the valley, and about half a mile S.W. of
Fordingbridge, at Ashford[2693] railway station, is a gravel-pit,
which was largely worked for the purpose of ballasting the railway,
and in this |633| gravel also, implements have been found; first
by Mr. Toomer, of Salisbury, in 1866, and subsequently by Mr. James
Brown, myself, and others. Several specimens are preserved in the
Blackmore Museum, one of which is shown in Fig. 473. It is of ochreous
flint, with the angles slightly waterworn. Some of the implements
found in this gravel have been much rolled. Mr. J. W. Brooke, of |634|
Marlborough, has in his collection a series of about forty implements
and flakes from Fordingbridge, many of them water-worn.
[Illustration: Fig. 473.—Fordingbridge. 1∕2]
The gravel here rests upon Tertiary beds, and consists principally of
subangular flints, with many Lower Tertiary pebbles, a few pieces of
greensand iron-stone, and more rarely quartz pebbles among them. The
beds are about 10 feet thick, and their height above the river about 40
feet. Remains of mammoth[2694] have been found in them.
Farther down the course of the Avon, palæolithic implements have not
as yet been found; and in the basin of the Stour, which joins the
Avon at Christchurch, but one discovery has been made. This was of
a small brown ochreous implement, made from a large external flake,
trimmed into a somewhat kidney-shaped outline, and having its edges
worn round, and its angles waterworn. It was found at Wimborne Minster,
by Mr. W. F. Tiffin, of Salisbury, in gravel brought from a pit in
the neighbourhood, and not _in situ_. I have searched for implements,
but in vain, in some of the pits near Wimborne, though the gravel,
especially at Oakley, has all the characters of a deposit likely to
contain them.
Though the united Avon and Stour now find their way into the sea
near Christchurch, it seems probable, as will subsequently be shown,
that they were in remote times affluents of a river running from
west to east, and that a portion of this river, now widened out by
the sea, |635| has become the Solent between the Isle of Wight and
the mainland. The course of this ancient river appears to have been
a little to the south and seaward of the present line of the coast
at Bournemouth; and some of the gravels which formerly lined its
valley now cap the cliffs for some distance between Poole Harbour and
Hengistbury Head, and thence on in the direction of Portsmouth.
In these gravels, a very large number of palæolithic implements has
been found. The first discovery at Bournemouth was made in 1866,[2695]
by Mr. Alfred H. Stevens, of Salisbury, and in immediately subsequent
years they were principally due to Dr. H. P. Blackmore, my son, P.
Norman Evans, Mr. Albert Way, and others. The first implements were
found in the gravel, after it had been dug and spread upon the roads;
but Dr. Blackmore found an implement _in situ_, and two or three rough
flakes, close to Boscombe Mouth, at almost the highest point of the
cliff, more than 100 feet above the sea-level.
[Illustration: Fig. 474.—Boscombe, Bournemouth. 1∕2]
This implement, which is nearly white and unworn, is preserved in the
Blackmore Museum, and is represented in Fig. 474. Numerous implements
of other forms have since been found in the gravel dug in the
neighbourhood of Boscombe. Among them is a side-scraper 3 1∕2 inches
long and of the same type as that from Santon Downham, Fig. 437. It
was found by Mrs. E. Sandars, of Bournemouth, who has kindly added it
to my collection. A rude chopper-like implement was also found there.
One of the finest, however, of all the early Boscombe implements is
that shown in Fig. 475, which was found by my son Norman in 1868. It
has unfortunately lost a portion near the |636| base, through a crack
in the stone, but is otherwise perfect. The material is not, as usual,
flint from the Chalk, but chert from the Upper Greensand. The surface
is slightly ochreous, and to some extent lustrous. I have another
implement of chert, but of ovate form, found at Boscombe, as well as
some good pointed implements of flint. In the railway-cutting east of
Boscombe, I, some years ago, found a flake of flint. Other implements
have been found in gravel which is believed to have been dug to the
west of Bournemouth, near the Bourne Valley Pottery and the turnpike
on the Poole road. That shown in Fig. 476 was found by Miss Way, and
kindly communicated to me by her father, the late Mr. Albert Way,
F.S.A. It is of flint, now of a milky-white colour. Mr. Way has found
three or four other specimens of much the same character. I have two
large, rather coarsely chipped, irregularly oval specimens from the
same gravels, both found by my son Norman.
[Illustration: Fig. 475.—Boscombe, Bournemouth. 1∕2]
The beds near the turnpike are from about 6 to 8 feet thick, and rest
on a slightly irregular surface of Bagshot Sands. The gravel |637|
consists principally of subangular and rolled flints, a few Tertiary
flint-pebbles, a considerable proportion of small quartz pebbles, and
a few fragments of old rocks and Upper Greensand chert; the whole in a
sandy matrix, and having in places some sandy seams. I am not aware of
any mammalian or molluscan remains having been found in them. They are
nearly, if not quite, on the summit of table-land, slightly inclining
seawards, and with the valley of the Bourne to the north, with higher
ground beyond it and also to the west. The surface near the turnpike is
about 130 feet above the mean sea-level.
Following the presumed course of the ancient river Solent for about ten
miles eastward, along what is now the coast, we come to Barton. For the
whole distance the land to the north is thickly capped with gravel; and
at Barton, on the slope of the cliff, a flat, oval implement, 6 inches
long, and in form much like that from Hill Head, Fig. 466, was found
by an officer of the Coast Guard, about 1868, and was subsequently
presented to the Christy Collection by Mr. Albert Way, F.S.A.
[Illustration: Fig. 476.—Bournemouth. 1∕2]
Since that time an astonishing number of palæolithic implements has
been found in the district extending from Chuton Bunny by Barton and
Hordwell to Milford. I have about sixty specimens from this district
in my own collection, many of them very perfect of their kind. For
the most part they have been picked up on the shore and on the talus
of the gravel-capped cliff, but they have occasionally been found in
the gravel itself. A few have been made of Upper Greensand chert, but
the majority are of flint. Nearly all the usual types are represented,
several by large examples. I have pointed, oval, and ovate specimens,
as much as 8 and 8 1∕2 inches in length. Those from the gravel are
as a rule sharp and but little abraded, while the condition of those
found on the shore depends upon the length of time that they have been
exposed to the rolling action of the sea since their fall from the
cliff. |638|
A palæolithic flake has been found still farther east, at Stone,[2696]
between Exbury and Calshot Castle.
[Illustration: Fig. 477.—Broom Pit, Axminster. 1∕2]
Assuming the existence of an ancient river Solent flowing at an
elevation of upwards of 100 feet above the present level of the sea at
Bournemouth, its western sources must have drained much the same basin
as that of the rivers now discharging into Poole Harbour; but without
at present entering into that question, I may mention the discovery of
a palæolithic implement at Dewlish, about 3 miles N. of Piddletown,
Dorsetshire, by Mr. James Brown, of Salisbury. It is very neatly
chipped, but slightly unsymmetrical in form, one side being straight
and the other curved; but in general character it resembles Fig. 430
from Thetford, having been made from a large flake, and showing the
original crust of the flint at its base. It was found on the surface,
at the top of a high hill, at no great distance from the branch of the
Trent or Piddle, which flows past Dewlish. Elephant[2697] remains have
been found near the same place, which have, however, been assigned to
_Elephas meridionalis_. |639|
In the Blackmore Museum there were in 1872 four implements of chert,
of oval and tongue-shaped types, found during the erection of the
telegraph posts between Chard and Axminster. There was also another
thin oval implement of ochreous flint, 7 1∕2 inches long and 3 1∕2
broad, which was found near Colyton, Devon. The exact locality where
those first mentioned were found, is unknown; but it appears probable
that the gravel, like that at Colyton, belongs to the valley of the
Axe, in which I suggested in 1872 that further search should be made.
Such a search has long since been rewarded. In 1877[2698] I recorded
some discoveries at Broom, near Axminster, and in 1878 the late Mr. W.
S. M. D’Urban[2699] gave an account of the ballast pit at Broom, in
the parish of Hawkchurch, near Axminster, and close to the river Axe.
It was worked in a low hill consisting of chert gravel intermingled
with seams of ferruginous and sandy clay, and a section was exposed
about 40 feet deep, the base being about 150 feet above the level of
the sea, which comes within a distance of about six miles. At that time
numerous palæolithic implements of various types had been found in the
pit. They were formed of dark Upper Greensand chert, and some were
much water-worn, while others were quite sharp and uninjured. Since
then very many more have been collected, and a fine series of them is
preserved in the Albert Memorial Museum at Exeter. There are also some
good specimens in the Horniman Museum[2700] at Forest Hill, S.E. I have
engraved a typical example of the ovate form in my own collection as
Fig. 477.
Some implements from Broom are of large size. I have a very rude
specimen that I found among the ballast on the South Western Railway
in August, 1877. It is 8 1∕2 inches long and 6 inches wide. Other
specimens are small. The ovate type seems to predominate, but the
pointed forms are not scarce. A few broad flakes trimmed at the edges,
of the so-called Le Moustier type, occur with the other forms.
In the valley of the Culm, at Kentisbeare, near Cullompton, Mr. W.
Downes,[2701] in 1879, found a chert implement in form like Plate II.,
Fig. 17.
With the exception of those from the bone-caves of Devonshire, no
palæolithic implements have as yet been found farther west in Britain.
|640|