Forbidden Archeology: The Hidden History of the Human Race

After Broca’s remarks, Capellini (1877, p. 60) himself offered some concluding words: “I have of course taken into consideration bones gnawed by different animals. At the same time, I have not neglected to examine all the kinds of fish teeth found in the same strata as the small whales, of which Mr. Lawley possesses a truly extraordinary collection. If one comes to tell me that with such teeth (using them as tools) he has been able to make such marks as you see on the fossil bones, I am ready to admit this, but if he pretends that the fish itself made the marks, that is another thing. In that case I would invite my illustrious contradictor to bring to my consideration the species of fish to which he would attribute marks identical to those we know as the work of man.” Capellini (1877, p. 61) pointed out that such objections had not been raised by the naturalists who were knowledgeable about fish, but rather by archeologists.

One naturalist suggested the marks had been made by a swordfish, and to demonstrate this had taken a swordfish beak in hand, delivering thrusts that left some impressive marks on pieces of fresh whalebone. But even de Mortillet (1883, p. 61), on seeing them and comparing them with the incisions on the Tuscany fossils, rejected this view.

De Quatrefages was among the scientists accepting the Monte Aperto Balaenotus bones as being cut by sharp flint instruments held by a human hand. He wrote: “However one may try, using various methods and implements of other materials, one will fail to duplicate the marks. Only a sharp flint instrument, moved at an angle and with a lot of pressure, could do it” (de Quatrefages 1884, pp. 93–94). De Quatrefages believed a band of Pliocene hunters found the whale beached and set upon it with stone knives of the type used by the present-day Australian aboriginals.

The whole issue was nicely summarized in English by S. Laing, who wrote in 1893 (pp. 115–116): “An Italian geologist, M. Capellini, has found in the Pliocene strata of Monte Aperto, near Siena, bones of the Balaeonotus, a well-known species of a sort of Pliocene whale, which are scored by incisions obviously made by a sharp-cutting instrument, such as a flint knife guided by design, and by a human hand. At first it was contended that these incisions might have been made by the teeth of fishes, but as specimens multiplied, and were carefully examined, it became evident that no such explanation was possible. The cuts are in regular curves, and sometimes almost semi-circular, such as a sweep of the hand could alone have caused, and they invariably show a clean cut surface on the outer or convex side, to which the pressure of a sharp edge was applied, with a rough or abraided surface on the inner side of the cut. Microscopic examination of the cuts confirms this conclusion, and leaves no doubt that they must have been made by such an instrument as a flint knife, held obliquely and pressed against the bone while in a fresh state, with considerable force, just as a savage would do in hacking the flesh off a stranded whale. Cuts exactly similar can now be made on fresh bone by such flint knives, and in no other known or conceivable way. It seems, therefore, more like obstinate prepossession, than scientific skepticism, to deny the existence of Tertiary man, if it rested only on this single instance.”

Continuing his commentary, Laing (1893, p. 116) stated: “As regards the evidence from cut bones it is very conclusive, for experienced observers, with the aid of the microscope, have no difficulty in distinguishing between cuts which may have been made accidentally or by the teeth of fishes, and those which can only have been made in fresh bone by a sharp cutting instrument, such as a flint knife.”

A modern authority, Binford, stated (1981, p. 169): “There is little chance that an observer of modified bone would confuse cut marks inflicted during dismembering or filleting by man using tools with the action of animals.” Binford (1981, p. 169) further noted: “The marks of animals’ teeth are somewhat different. They follow the contours of the bone’s surface. . . . Tooth marks may frequently take the form of depressed or mashed lines. . . . On many of the wolf specimens, the tooth mark under magnification appears as a ‘cracked’ surface scar rather than as a cut or incision in the bone.”

But the teeth of sharks are sharper than those of terrestrial mammalian carnivores such as wolves and might produce marks on bone that more closely resemble those that might be made by cutting implements. After inspecting fossil whale bones in the paleontology collection of the San Diego Natural History Museum, we concluded that shark’s teeth can in fact make marks closely resembling those that might be made by implements. However, we also concluded that it is nevertheless possible, in some cases, to distinguish marks made by implements from those made by shark teeth.