Men of the Old Stone Age: Their Environment, Life and Art

by Henry Fairfield Osborn

It is important to present in full the original opinions of Smith Woodward, who devoted most careful study to the first reconstruction of the skull (Fig. 67), a model which was subsequently modified by the actual discovery of one of the canine teeth. In his original description it is observed that the pieces of the skull preserved are noteworthy for the great thickness of the bone, it being 11 to 12 mm. as compared with 5 to 6 mm., the average thickness in the modern European skull, or 6 to 8 mm., the thickness in the skull of the Neanderthal races and in that of the modern Australian; the cephalic index is estimated at 78 or 79, that is, the skull is believed to have been proportionately low and wide, almost brachycephalic; there was apparently no prominent or thickened ridge above the orbits, a feature which immediately distinguishes this skull from that of the Neanderthal races; the several bones of the brain-case are typically human and not in the least like those of the anthropoid apes; the brain capacity was originally estimated at 1070 c.cm., not equalling that of some of the lowest brain types in the existing Australian races and decidedly below that of the Neanderthal man of Spy and La Chapelle-aux-Saints; the nasal bones are typically human but relatively small and broad, so that the nose was flattened, resembling that in some of the existing Malay and African races.

Fig. 68. Three views of the Piltdown skull as reconstructed by J. H. McGregor, 1915. This restoration includes the nasal bones and canine tooth, which were not known at the time of Smith Woodward's reconstruction of 1913. One-quarter life size.

The jaw presents profoundly different characters; the whole of the bone preserved closely resembles that of a young chimpanzee; thus the slope of the bony chin as restored is between that of an adult ape and that of the Heidelberg man, with an extremely receding chin; the ascending portion of the jaw for the attachment of the temporal muscles is broad and thickened anteriorly. Associated with the jaw were two elongated molar teeth, worn down by use to such an extent that the individual could not have been less than thirty years of age and was probably older. These teeth are relatively longer and narrower than those in the modern human jaw. The canine tooth, identified by Smith Woodward as belonging in the lower jaw, strengthened by the evidence afforded by the jaw itself, proves that the face was elongate or prognathous and that the canine teeth were very prominent like those of the anthropoid apes; it affords definite proof that the front teeth of the Piltdown man resembled those of the ape.

The author's conclusion is that while the skull is essentially human, it approaches the lower races of man in certain characters of the brain, in the attachment of the muscles of the neck, in the large extent of the temporal muscles attached to the jaw, and in the probably large size of the face. The mandible, on the other hand, appears precisely like that of the ape, with nothing human except the molar teeth, and even these approach the dentition of the apes in their elongate shape and well-developed fifth or posterior intermediate cusp. This type of man, distinguished by the smooth forehead and supraorbital borders and ape-like jaw, represents a new genus called Eoanthropus, or 'dawn man,' while the species has been named dawsoni in honor of the discoverer, Charles Dawson. This very ancient type of man is defined by the ape-like chin and junction of the two halves of the jaw, by a series of parallel grinding-teeth, with narrow lower molar teeth, which do not diminish in size backward, and by the steep forehead and slight development of the brow ridges. The jaw manifestly differs from that of the Heidelberg man in its comparative slenderness and relative deepening toward the symphysis.

The discussion of this very important paper by Smith Woodward and Dawson centred about two points. First, whether the ape-like jaw really belonged with the human skull rather than with that of some anthropoid ape which happened to be drifted down in the same stratum; and second, whether the extremely low original estimate of the brain capacity of 1070 c.cm., was not due to incorrect adjustment or reconstruction of the separate pieces of the skull.

Keith,[(19)] the leader in the criticism of Woodward's reconstruction, maintained that when the two sides of the skull were properly restored and made approximately symmetrical, the brain capacity would be found to equal 1500 c.cm.; the brain cast of the skull even as originally reconstructed was found to be close to 1200 c.cm. This author agreed that skull, jaw, and canine tooth belonged to Eoanthropus but that they could not well belong to the same individual.

In defense of Woodward's reconstruction came the powerful support of Elliot Smith.[(20)] He maintained that the evidence afforded by the re-examination of the bones corroborated in the main Smith Woodward's identification of the median plane of the skull; further, that the original reconstruction of the prognathous face was confirmed by the discovery of the canine tooth, also that there remained no doubt that the association of the skull, the jaw, and the canine tooth was a correct one. The back portion of the skull is decidedly asymmetrical, a condition found both in the lower and higher races of man. A slight rearrangement and widening of the bones along the median upper line of the skull raise the estimate of the brain capacity to 1100 c.cm. as the probable maximum.

Elliot Smith continued that he considered the brain to be of a more primitive kind than any human brain that he had ever seen, yet that it could be called human and that it already showed a considerable development of those parts which in modern man we associate with the power of speech; thus, there was no doubt of the unique importance of this skull as representing an entirely new type of "man in the making." As regards the form of the lower jaw, it was observed that in the dawn of human existence teeth suitable for weapons of offense and defense were retained long after the brain had attained its human status. Thus the ape-like form of the chin does not signify inability to speak, for speech must have come when the jaws were still ape-like in character, and the bony changes that produced the recession of the tooth line and the form of the chin were mainly due to sexual selection, to the reduction in the size of the grinding-teeth, and, in a minor degree, to the growth and specialization of the muscles of the jaw and tongue employed in speech.