ANTHROPOLITES, the name given to Human Fossil Remains. Although at one time it was thought that human remains were often found fossilised,.the investigations of modern anatomist; have shown that in most of these cases the supposition has been false. Daubenton first demonstrated that some bones which had long been regarded in Paris as the remains of a gigantic human being belonged to a lower tribe of beings. The researches of Curler gave a clue by which all cases might be tested, and most of the earlier instances brought. forward have been referred to their correct types.
Human fossil bones have, however, been discovered in the Belgian bone-caverns, with bears, rodents, &c., and are figured by Dr. Soh merl ing, in his interesting work on the bones found in a cavern near Dr. Buckbuul (' Bridgewater Treatise') remarks that frequent dis coveries have been made of human bones and rude works of art in natural caverns, sometimes inclosed in stalactite, at other times in beds of earthy materials, which are interspersed with bones of extinct species of quadrupeds. These cases, he thinks, may be explained by the common practice of mankind in all ages to bury their dead in such convenient repositories. " The accidental circumstance," continues Dr. Bud:land, " that many caverns contained the bones of extinct species of other animals, dispersed through the same soil in which human bodies may, at any subsequent period, have been buried, affords no proof of the time when these remains of men were introduced. :Many of the caverns have been inhabited by savage tribes, who, for convenience of occupation, have repeatedly disturbed portions of soil in which their predecessors may have been buried. Such disturbances will explain the occasional admixture of fragment& of human skeletons and the bones of modern quadrupeds with those of extinct species introduced at more early periods and by natural causes. Several
accounts have been published within the last few years of human remains discovered in the caverns of France and in the province of which are described as being of the same antiquity with the bones of hyaenas and other extinct quadrupeds that accompany them. Most of these may probably admit of explanation by reference to the causes just enumerated. In the case of caverns which form the channels of subterranean rivers, or which are subject to occasional inundations, another cause of the admixture of human bones with the remains of intim:11s of more ancient date may be found in the movements occasioned by running water." The same learned author observes that the most remarkable and only recorded case of human skeletons imbedded in a solid limestone rock is that on the shore of Guadeloupe, adding that there is however no reason to consider these bones to be of high antiquity, as the rock in which they occur is of very recent formation, and is composed of agglutinated fragments of shells and corals which inhabit the adjacent water. Such kind of stone is frequently formed in a few years from sand-banks composed of similar material& on the shores of tropical seas. (' Bridgewater Treatise,' voL i.) One of these skeletons, described by Mr. Konig PhiL Trans.; 1814) is in the British Museum. See further as to the 'rock in which the skeletons are imbedded, Linn. Trans.,' 1818, vol. ill.
Dr. Lund published, sonic year& ago, discovery of human remains with those of .3fcgotherium, &c.; and he was of opinion that the former were of the same epoch as those of the latter. The cranium had the peculiar shape which distinguishes the ancient Peruvian.