WAS IT A FAKE?

Dominion, Volume 19, Issue 119, 13 February 1926, Page 9

WAS IT A FAKE?

DRAWING SCRATCHED ON* OLD BONE LEARNED GENTLEMEN AT VARIANCE Bi Tblegraph-—Press Association Copyright. (Rec. February 12, 8.15 p.m.) London, February 12. An amusing controversy has arisen between two distinguished professors, both ex-presidents of the Geological Society, whether a horse’s head scratched on an old bone found near the famous boys’ school af Sherborne, Dorset, was graved by a man of the stone age or a mischievous schoolboy. The bone was found in 1914, was inspected by eminent authorities, and formed the subject of a lecture before the geological Society by Sir Arthur Smith Woodward, who described it as an example of paleolithic art. Professor Solles, in a learned treatise on "The Ancient Hunter,” recently described it bluntly as a forgery perpetrated by some schoolboys. Sir Arthur Woodward thereupon wrote to the periodical "Nature,” stating that he was surprised at such a statement. The drawing must have been made when the bone was fresh, whereas when found it was semi-fossilised. He added that the Geological Societv generally accepted the paleolithic theory. Sir Arthur Woodward then got into touch with Mr. Arnaldo Cortesi, one of the two schoolboys who found the bone. Mr. Cortesi confirmed its genuineness, and said that at the age of fifteen he was too ignorant to participate in such a trick.

Professor Solles, however, got into touch with Mr. C. J. Baysand, who was formerly engaged at Sherborne arranging museum Collections, who said that it was a trick played solely for the benefit of the Science master. Its success caused much merriment among the bovs, particularly those under this master. The bone was found near a roadside rubbish bean “I was invited to inspect the fake,” he added. Sir Arthur Woodward, interviewed by the “Daily Chronicle” last night, said: “If I was hoaxed a lot of others were hoaxed too, but I firmly believe that Professor Solles is wrong. It is a piece of a rib of a horse semi-fossilised, with a drawing of a wild horse scratched on it, the sort of horse which inhabited Eurone in the early days with its mane standing up instead of hanging down.” There the matter stands at present. The solution is not so simple apparently as in the case of the Pickwickian Controversy about the stone inscribed “Bill Stumps, his mark.”—Aus.-N.Z. Cable Assn.