OUR MOST REMOTE ANCESTOR.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 135, 9 June 1926, Page 7

OUR MOST REMOTE ANCESTOR.

SKULL FOUND IN AUSTRALIA. SOTEHTieTS' KEEN INTEREST. MAN OR MERE LDK ? (By Cable.—Press Association.—Copjrisnt.; (Received 11 a.m.) XEW YORK, June S. Dr. Franz Boas, Professor of Anthropology at the Columoia University, commenting on the Cohuna skull, said Professor MacKenzie"s claims -were not impossible, but it was unlikely the type of mammal fauna found in Australia is exceedingly ancient, yet none of the forms to which man is the more closely related seems to be there. They would, therefore, hardly anticipate finding the earliest forms of man in Australia. Asia still seems the more likely field. Dr. William Gregory, curator of comparative and human anatomy in the American Museum of Natural History, wbo is particularly familiar with Australian conditions, due to his studies in that continent, said the primitive characteristics of the skull are not necessary to indicate age. The depth at which it is found and the fact that it was discovered in close proximity to two modern skulls ot aboriginals has no great bearing on the matter. Dr. Gregory says: '"I note that although it is impossible to accept the claim of logical antiquity, the Cohuna skull has a strong resemblance to the Talgai skull." Australian scientists, including Professor MacKenzie, are more than competent, however, to settle the question of the skull's antiquity. There are few countries that present so brilliant a group of scientific men as Australia. The evidence is there and they will most certainly find it.— (A. and X.Z. i The discovery by Professor MacKenzie at Cohuna, near the Murray River, of the skull more ancient than any known human remains, caused Dr. Grafton Elliott Smith, president of the Anatomical Society of Britain, to say that final judgment depended on the evidence provided by Professor MacKenzie, but he was not* inclined to think there was any possibility of anything found in Australia being as old as the Piltdown skull. The Piltdown man was living in Europe hundreds of thousands of years before human beings could have reached Australia. It seemed incredible that anything approaching the age of the Piltdown man could be found in Australia, where the oldest human remains were probably not more than 4000 or 5000 years.

Dr. Smith said that Professor MacKenzie was highly competent, but at the same time it was hard to believe that his claim was true. Piltdown is a parish near Uckneld. Sussex. England, where in 1911. Dawson, of Lewes, found parts of a skull which he reconstructed as that of a type of primitive man. The skull is called the Piltdown skull and the type the Piltdown man.

The ""Taungs'sknll" \va* found in July. 192.5. in a limestone cliff at Taungs, 40 miles south of Vryburjf, Bechuanaland. It was believed to be that of a creature representing the missing link between man and the great apes. The discovery was due to Professor Raymond Dart, an Australian, who. with other anthropologists, believe that Africa, not Asia, would provide the missing link. Other scientists confirmed Professor Dart's conclusion that the Taungs skull was much earlier in evolution than the Rrokcn HUl' ( Australia) skull. Professor Dart said the anthropoid represented by the Taungs skull was sufficiently intelligent to leave the tropical forest for the untoward environment of what is now the Kalahari Desert, and which then probably was a lacustrine resion. He could use weapons of offence and defence, and he lived on fruits and roots.