Read Ebook: Notes on the Fenland; with A Description of the Shippea Man by Hughes Thomas McKenny Macalister Alex Alexander Contributor

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Perhaps the most interesting animal whose remains are found in the Fens is the Beaver. Why do we not find here and there a beaver dam? Perhaps it is because we have not been on the look-out for it, and the peat-cutters would not have seen anything remarkable in the occurrence of a quantity of timber anywhere in the Fens. We must suppose that the peat which often contains whole forests of trees and even canoes would have preserved the timber of the beaver dam. It is an animal too which might have contributed largely towards the formation of the Fens by holding up and diverting meandering streams. Perhaps it did not make dams down in the Fens, and the skeletons we find are those of stray individuals or of dead animals which have floated down from dams near Trumpington or Chesterford; very suitable places for them. We want more evidence about the fen beaver.

I have heard that there are beavers in the Danube which do not make dams, but among those introduced into this country in recent years the dam building instinct seems to have survived the change. The beavers on the Marquis of Bute's property in Scotland cut down trees and built dams as did the beavers in Sir Edmund Loder's park in Sussex, and even in the Zoological Gardens they recently constructed a "lodge." We have not found the beaver in the Gravels.

Part of the skull of a Walrus was brought to us a long time ago and said to have been found in the peat. But it is a very suspicious case. It does not look like a bone that had been long entombed in peat, and we are not so far from the coast as to make it improbable that it was carried there by some sailor returning home from northern seas.

Bones of Cetaceans are thrown up on the shore near Hunstanton, and Seals are still not uncommon in the Wash, so that we need not attach much importance to the occurrence in marine silt of Whale, Grampus, Porpoise, and such like.

BIRDS.

We have paid much attention to the birds of the Fens, partly because of the occurrence of some unexpected species, and also because of the absence, so far as our collection goes, of species of which we should expect to find large numbers.

Perhaps the most interesting are the remains of Pelican . Of this we have two bones, not associated nor in the same state of preservation. The determination we have on the authority of Alphonse Milne Edwards and Professor Alfred Newton. One of the bones is that of a bird so young that it cannot have flown over but shows that it must have been hatched or carried here.

We find in the Fens of course everything of later date, down to the drowned animals of last winter's storm, or the stranded pike left when the flood went down. It is a curious fact and very like instinct at fault that in floods the pike wander into shallow water and linger in the hollows till too late to get back to the river, so that large numbers of them are found dead when the water has soaked in or evaporated. An old man told me that he well remembered when pike were more abundant they used to dig holes along the margin when the flood was rising and when it went down commonly found several fine pike in them. This explains why we so often find the bones of pike in the peat, but where did the pike get into a habit so little conducive to the survival of the species?

Although we notice at the present day a constant change in the mollusca, their general continuity throughout the long ages from pre-glacial times is a very remarkable fact.

MAN.

Every step in the line of enquiry we have been following, from whatever point of view we have regarded the evidence, has forced upon us the conclusion that a long interval elapsed between the Areniferous and Turbiferous series as seen in the Fens; and yet, having regard to the geographical history of the area with which we commenced, we cannot but feel that the various deposits represent only episodes in a continuous slow development due to changes of level both here and further afield and the accidents incidental to denudation.

But the particular deposits which we are examining happen to have been laid down near sea level where small changes produce great effects. We may feel assured that over the adjoining higher ground the changes would have been imperceptible when they were occurring and the results hardly noticeable.

If the Fen Beds include nearly the whole of the Neolithic stage the idea that glacial conditions then prevailed over the adjoining higher ground is quite untenable.

So far everything has taught us that the Fens occupy a well-defined position in the evolution of the geographical features of East Anglia and also that the fauna is distinctive, and, having regard to the whole facies, quite different from that of the sands and gravels which occur at various levels all round and pass under the Turbiferous Series of the Fens.

We will now enquire what is the place of these deposits in the "hierarchy" based upon the remains of man and his handiwork.

No Palaeolithic remains have ever been found in the Fen deposits. We must not infer from this that there is everywhere evidence of a similar break or long interval of time between the Palaeolithic and Neolithic ages. There are elsewhere remains of man and his handiwork which we must refer to later Palaeolithic than anything found in the Areniferous Series just near the Fen Beds, and there are, not far off, remains of man's handiwork which appear to belong to the Neolithic age, but to an earlier part of it than anything yet found in association with the Fen Beds.

The newer Palaeolithic remains referred to occur chiefly in caves and the older Neolithic objects are for the most part transitional forms of implement found on the surface in various places around but outside the Fens and in the great manufactures of implements at Cissbury and Grimes Graves, in which we can study the embryology of Neolithic implements and observe the development of forms suggested by those of Palaeolithic age or by nature. The sequence and classification adopted in these groups, both those of later Palaeolithic and those of earlier Neolithic age, are confirmed by an examination of the contemporary fauna; the Areniferous facies prevailing in the caves and the Turbiferous facies characterising the pits and refuse-heaps of Cissbury and Grimes Graves.

+ Position of skeleton.

Dressed flint flake on surface.

Some of the bones were broken and much decayed, while others, when carefully extracted, dried and helped out with a little thin glue, became very sound and showed by the surface markings that they had suffered only from the moisture and not from any wear in transport.

The most interesting point about them is the protuberant brow, which, when first seen on the detached frontal bone, before the skull had been restored, suggested comparison with that of the Neanderthal man.

Much greater importance was attached to that character when the Neanderthal skull was found.

The best authorities who have seen the skull since it has been restored by Mr C. E. Gray, our skilful First Attendant in the Sedgwick Museum, refer it to the Bronze Age which falls well within the limits which I assigned.

This skull is unique among the few that I have obtained from the Fens. Dr Duckworth has described most of these, and I subjoin a description of the Shippea man by Professor Alexander Macalister.

DESCRIPTION OF THE SHIPPEA MAN BY PROF. A. MACALISTER.

"The calvaria is large, dark coloured and much broken. The base, facial bones and part of the left brow ridge and glabella are gone. The sutures are coarsely toothed and visible superficially although ankylosis has set in in the inner face. The bone is fairly thick , and on the inner face the pacchionian pits are large and deep on each side of the middle line especially in the bregmatic part of the frontal and the post-bregmatic part of the parietals. The superior longitudinal groove is deep but narrow, and, as far as the broken condition allows definite tracing, the cerebral convolution impressions are of the typical pattern.

"The striking feature is the prominent brow ridge due to the large frontal sinus. The glabella was probably prominent and the margins on each side are large and rough and extend outwards to the supraorbital notches. The outer part of the supraorbital margin and the processus jugalis are thick, coarse and prominent .

"In norma verticalis the skull is ovoid-pentagonoid euryme-topic with conspicuous rounded parietal eminences, slight flattening at the obelion and a convex planum interparietale below it .

"In norma lateralis the brow ridges are conspicuous; above them is the sulcus transversus from which the frontal ascends with a fairly uniform curve to the bregma. The frontal sagittal arc above the ophryon measures 112 mm. and its chord 116. Behind the bregma the parietals along the front half of the sagittal suture have a fairly flat outline to the medio-parietal region, behind which the flattened obelion is continued downwards with a uniform slope to the middle of the planum interparietale whence it probably descended by a much steeper curve to the inion, which is lost. The parietal sagittal arc, including the region where there was probably a supra-lambdoid ossicle, was about 140 mm. and its chord 121 but the curve is not uniform.

"In norma occipitalis the sagittal suture appears at the summit of a ridge whose parietal sides slope outwards forming with each other an angle of 138?, as far as the parietal eminences. From these the sides drop vertically down to the large mastoid processes. The intermastoid width at the tips of the processes is 115, but at the supramastoid crest is 148 .

"In norma frontalis the conspicuous feature is the brow ridge. This gives a kind of superficial suggestion of a Neanderthaloid shape, but the broad and well arched frontal dispels the illusory likeness. The jugal processes jut out giving a biorbital breadth of 115 mm. while the least frontal width is 97 and the bistephanic expands to 125. There is a slight median ridge on the frontal ascending from the ophryon, at first narrow but expanding at the bregma to 50 mm. The surface of this elevated area is a little smoother than that of the bone on each side of it.

"The other long bones are mostly broken at their extremities. The femora are strong and platymeric. The postero-lateral rounded edge, which bears on its hinder face the insertion of the gluteus maximus, taken in connexion with the projection of the thin medial margin of the shaft below the tuberculum colli inferior causes the upper end of the shaft to appear flattened. The index of platymeria is ?55. The femoral length cannot have been less than 471 mm. The man was probably of middle stature, not a giant as was the Gristhorpe man. The tibiae are also broken at their ends, they are eurycnemic with sharp sinuous shin and flat back, the length may have been between 335 and 340 mm. The humeri are also bones with strong muscular crests, and the ulnae are smooth and long. The fibula was channelled. There is nothing in the bone-features which is inconsistent with the reference of the skull to the Brachycephalic Bronze Age race.

"In the following Table are recorded the measurements of the different regions. The two crania which I have selected to compare with it are a Round-barrow skull from near Stonehenge and the Gristhorpe skull, to both of which it bears a very strong family likeness.

Shippea Stonehenge Hill Gristhorpe Maximal length 194 185 192 Maximal breadth 153 153 156 Auricular height 135 132 133 Biorbital width 115 112 117 Bistephanic width 128 132 133 Least frontal width 97 103 106 Biasterial 120 127 125 Auriculo-glabellar radius 116 113 114 Auriculo-ophryal radius 113 111 105 Auriculo-metopic radius 134 127 124 Auriculo-bregmatic radius 137 132 134 Auriculo-lambdoid radius 104 102 115 Length and breadth index 78?87 82?7 81?25

"The resemblance to the two Round-barrow skulls of the Bronze Age is too great to be accidental, so we may regard this as a representative of that race, possibly at an earlier stage than the typical form of which the two selected specimens are examples .

"The mandible also resembles that of the Gristhorpe skull in general shape of angle and prominence of chin.

"The measurements are as appended:

Shippea Stonehenge Hill Gristhorpe Condylo mental length 131 -- 130 Gonio mental length 100 -- 99 Bigoniac 115 -- 116 Bicondylar 139 -- 141 Chin height 32 -- 33"

Cambridge: PRINTED BY JOHN CLAY, M.A. AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS

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