Under the “Totem-Pole”

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 877, 22 January 1930, Page 6

Under the “Totem-Pole”

| No further letters will he I answered under the Totem Pole until Wednesday, Febru- 1 . ary 12, as Redfeather will be , on furlough until Monday, 1 February 10. ANCIENT NORFOLK Over considerable areas in Norfolk and Suffolk a remarkable deposit known as crag is to be seen. It is composed of the sand and shells laid down by a cold sea which overwhelmed East Anglia many hundreds of thousands of years ago. and beneath the crag are found the remains of the old land surface which existed before the great submergence. On fills surface man lived and made flint implements, and a new discovery of these has been made by Mr. J. Sainty at Thorpe, near Norwich. The chalk is exposed in i.he river valley at Norwich, and resting on thefj surface of it is a strange accumulation called the stone bed. It is made up of thousands of flints, and with these are found the bones and teeth of the longextinct animals which roamec through Norfolk in pre-crag days. Mr. Sainty has had a successful digging. and has discovered a number of definite flint implements in the stone bed. These show that ever, in that far-distant time man knew what kind of tools to make and how to make them. There are well-mad© points for piercing, choppers for cutting wood and bone, and scrapers of various types for dressing skins. Among the scrapers is a remarkable example which, both because of its size and its excellent workmanship, is an outstanding discovery. It is formed from a huge flak'e, about two inches thick lit the widest part, where it was held in the hand, while the thinner square end is beautifully flaked and trimmed. ; Such specimens as these give us some idea of the people who ma ~\ them. No puny, weak person could have used an implement like this, and it is certain that its maker must have possessed a reasoning brain and *> complete control of his raw' material. When it is realised that this scra *** was made at least half a million ye^ l * ago. we see how immensely ancient is the human race. The climate of Pliocene times w Norfolk was very warm,-and with an abundance of first-class flint and wii animals life in those days must feav® been far from unpleasant. There can be little doubt that man was -*j using implements of bone and woou* and it is hoped that before long mens of these will be found in the stc bed. JERRY BUILDING Two men were gazing at a nev | building that was being erected in country lane. , ‘ What is it to be?" asked one them. * “Well," said the other, “if I -fi a tenant for it it is a bungalow; » £ can’t it’s a barn.”