THE TAUNGS SKULL.

Press, Volume LXI, Issue 18430, 10 July 1925, Page 9

THE TAUNGS SKULL.

DEFENCE OF MISSING LINK THEORY. (BT CABL*—rREoS ASSOCIATION—COrTKIGHT.) \SYDSEt "Sirs" Service.) LONDON, .Tuly S. In refcreueo to the controversy concerning Sir Arthur Keith's challenge to Professor Dart's tlie;-y of tho Taungs skull, Professor Grafton KlHott Smith, who arranged ilie exhibit* at the South African pavilion, where casts of the skull, as well as of its brains, were displayed alongside a. chimpanzee's head, said in an interview that ho disagreed with Sir Arthur Keith.

"The. exhibit impressively confirms the accuracy ot Professor Dart's general conclusion that tho skull is the most wonderful fossil yet discovered,'' said Professor Smith. "It reveals for the first time tho form of the head and brain of the extinct manlike ape. showing more definite signs of human affinities than any previously found. Every other competent scientist in Great Britain who examined tho evidence was convinced that Professor Dart had made good his claims. The geographical factor that Professor Dart emphasises—namely-, that the Taungs ape had wandered hundreds of miles from the forest belt—is tho surest proof of the acquired ability to live independently of trees, thereby differing profoundly from tho chimpanzee and gorilla, which aro entirely dependent on forests. Sir Arthur Keith completely ignores this consideration," concluded Professor Smith.

A scientific discovery declared to be of first importance- was made at Taungs, lieeliuanuland, by Professor Raymond Dart, of Brisbane, a fossil skull, representing something between a man and the great ape, being found 50ft deep in limestone, cliffs. The anatomical professor at tbo Rand Viuversity pronounced that the gap had beea filled between tho most primitive, man and the most advanced ape. The inuivid a! was not an apelike man, but a manlii.e ape, unable to talk, but more intel igent that a gorilla. Professor D.irt sad that tho ape would have been sufficiently intelligent to lcavo tho tropical forest for the untoward environment of tho Kalahari Desert. It could have- used weapons of offenco and defence, and lived on fruits and roots. Sir Arthur Keith, writing in tho journal "Nature," after an examination of tho casts of the Taunts skull, said that it was preposterous to claim that it is tho skull of a young anthropoid ape. At most it represents a genus in the group. Sir Arthur Keith is in tho very front rank of tho world's scientists, and is regarded by many as the leading anthropologist of tho day. He is at'present Conservator of the Museum and Hunterian Professor of tho Royal College of Surgeons of England. His books on anatomy and anthropological- subjects aro accepted as standard works.