Forbidden Archeology: The Hidden History of the Human Race

Garrigou did, however, meet with strong opposition at the Congress, from, among others, Professor Japetus Steenstrup, secretary of the Danish Royal Society of Science and director of the Museum of Zoology in Copenhagen. Steenstrup argued that a broken bone should have a percussion mark (Garrigou 1873, p. 140). The fractured edges of a bone fragment should converge at this point, where a blow had been struck. According to Steenstrup, the bones displayed by Garrigou did not show percussion marks and converging fractures. Steenstrup therefore believed that the bones had been broken by the gnawing of carnivores.

Garrigou disagreed that fragments must show a percussion mark; its absence would not, in the case of any particular fragment, rule out direct impact as the cause of fracturing. In experiments, Garrigou had seen fresh bones broken into many flakes by a blow, and only one or two flakes would have the percussion marks. And if the instrument used happened to be sharply pointed, the bone would split immediately like a piece of wood, with no percussion imprint whatsoever (Garrigou 1873, p. 141).

The observations of both Steenstrup and Garrigou are in line with modern test data. In support of Steenstrup, we find that Binford stated (1981, p. 163): “Impact scars from hitting the bone during marrow cracking are quite distinctive. First, they are almost always at a single impact point, which results in driving off short but rapidly expanding flakes inside the bone cylinder. At the point of impact the bone may be notched, in that a crescent-shaped notch is produced in the fracture edge of the bone.” But Binford’s surveys showed that only about

14–17 percent of bone splinters in marrow cracking assemblages will have impact notches on them, indicating human action; this lines up with Garrigou’s assertion that the vast majority of fragments will not have the impact marks. It would seem appropriate to analyze some Sansan bone splinter assemblages in terms of Binford’s impact notch frequency criterion to test for human or animal action.

Garrigou also pointed out that Steenstrup’s assertion that the bone breakage was caused by animal gnawing was incorrect, because the bones should then have displayed the marks of their canines and molars, and such was not the case. Animal gnawing results in extensive bone destruction, and the clean edges of the longitudinal fractures described by Garrigou contradicted that hypothesis.

Binford (1981, pp. 179–180) advised: “If one observes a pattern of bone destruction and knows that destruction is the normal consequence of animal behavior, one should view one’s task as disproof of the proposition that animals were responsible for the observed patterns. . . . One might suspect that the reverse strategy might prove helpful when a pattern of bone breakage or modification by percussion is noted. Namely, knowing that breakage is a normal consequence of human behavior, one should view one’s task the disproof of the proposal that man was responsible.” The bones of Sansan seem to fit in the category of breakage rather than destruction.

What sort of tests might be applied to disprove human action? Binford pointed out that animals typically destroy the articulator (or joint) ends of long bones during gnawing, whereas human breakage normally does not result in articulator destruction. Binford (1981, p. 173) suggested that it should therefore be possible to examine ratios of articulator ends to shaft pieces in broken bone assemblages as a method of discriminating between animal and human action. In the case of animal action, one would expect a low ratio of articulator ends to be present. Of course, the possibility that animals might scavenge bones left by humans introduces a complicating factor.

So in the case of the broken bones of Sansan we once more encounter evidence for a human presence in very ancient times. This evidence certainly cannot be ruled out in the absence of further study. Garrigou’s methodology and analysis appear to be quite rigorous, relying on sound taphonomic principles, extensive comparison with bones indisputably broken by human action, and evidence gathered from direct experiments in bone breakage patterns. We can only wonder why this report has remained buried. Whatever the reason, it would appear that the present data collection upon which ideas about human origins are based may be quite incomplete.

2.8 Pikermi, Greece (late Miocene)