The Eyasi Skull

Abstract

THE June 1946 issue of the Journal of the East Africa Natural History society contains two articles, one by Dr. L. S. B. Leakey entitled "Report on a visit to the site of the Eyasi skull found by Kohl-Larsen", and the other by W. H. Reeve on "A geological report on the site of Dr. Kohl-Larsen's discovery of a fossil human skull, Lake Eyasi, TangaVyika Territory". In the course of an expedition to the region of Lake Eyasi in Tanganyika Territory during 1934–36, Dr. Kohl-Larsen discovered there parts of three human skulls, together with some artefacts and fossil mammalian remains. The actual site is situated on the flats bordering the lake; and is approximately at the level to which the water rises during the wet seasons. The fossil human skull came from the so-called bone bed, a deposit of slightly consolidated sand. As the Eyasi deposits;have not been disturbed, they must be subsequent to the earth movements which immediately followed the Middle Pleistocene in those regions. There seems, however, no reason, either on archaeological or geological grounds, to question their late Pleistocene age, a date assigned to them by Dr. Kohl-Larsen. It may be added that the Eyasi strata contain minerals often found in Olduvai Bed 5, which also belongs to the sama period.