The Lower Palæo1ithic Implements of Sligo

Abstract

WHEN We pub1ihed in NATURE an account of the discovery of Lowcr Pa1aeo1ithic Implements in Ireland, we expected that the announcement would give rise to a certain amount of disturbance among the more old-fashioned archaeologists of that country, but we did not contemplate, or believe it possible, that the announcement would result in the appearance (NATURE, Nov. 5, pp. 652–3) of such a series of statements as that to which Prof. Macalister and hi associates have been so unwise as to append their signatures. Incredible a it may appear, it is nevertheless a fact, as is clear from the particulars published in NATURE (Nov. 5), that these investigators have not even correctly located the site at Rosses Point, Sligo, where the collapsed rock shelter exists, the details of which, as given in NATURE (Aug. 20), are preserved in excellent photographic and other records, which are to be made public shortly in the memoir to be published by us, but have mistaken the promontory of The Rosses for Rosses Point, which constitutes the northern projection of the former. Prof. Macalister and his associates clearly indicate in their note in NATURE that they visited this spot unknowingly, and thus failed to observe the collapsed rock shelter—or the Raised Beach of powdered shells. In view of this faulty observation it is not urpriing to find that these investigators state that “there is no Raised Beach…in the district.” This claim, however, is in direct opposition to the opInion expressed in the Geological Survey Memoir, “The Counties of Sligo and Leitrim,” p. 27.