With regard to the geological age of the stratum in which the skull was found, Mr. Clement Reid writes (loc. cit., p. 150) as follows:
"The deposits are not pre-Glacial or even early Pleistocene—they belong to an epoch long after the first cold period had passed away: but they occur at the very base of the great implement-bearing succession of Palæolithic deposits in the south-east of England." One noteworthy feature of the Piltdown skull is that it has a broad and flattened appearance with a cephalic index of about 79, which makes it an exception to Palæolithic crania hitherto recorded. The only other instance, known to me, of a brachycephalic skull having been found in undoubted Magdalénien deposits is that of Placard (Charente), which had a cephalic index of 80. Curiously enough, like the Piltdown specimen, it was also that of a female. According to M. Hervé its high cephalic index was partly due to its sex, but in all other respects it possessed characteristic dolichocephalic characters. I wonder if pressure had anything to do with the flattening of the Piltdown cranium.
2. Neanderthal-Spy race.—We have already (Chap. II, p. 36) described the circumstances in which the Neanderthal skeleton was discovered, from which it will be seen that it was only the calvaria that was recovered; and consequently there is no evidence as regards its facial characters (see Fig. 4). One
