Swanscombe, located near London, England by the River Thames is a region that has uncovered many fascinating finds in the last fifty years. Swanscombe revealed some of the most intriguing insight into mankind’s past by showing the evolutionary timetable to be somewhat false by direct evidence. The sight at Barnfield Pit, Swanscombe supplied archeologists with ancient human skulls that closely resembled modern human counterparts. The contradictory part is that these skulls were over 250,000 years old. Considering that these finds are so remarkable, why have the facts of the finds been so hidden?
During one of the warming periods between Ice Ages, about 250,000 years ago, a tribe of prehistoric hunters called Swanscombe Man appeared. It was probably a nomadic tribe that lived in temporary shelters along the River Thames. The tribe would have hunted animals that came to drink in waterholes. 8,000 years ago, France was connected to England via a land mass, allowing animals to cross from the continent.
Much of the knowledge of the Swanscombe Man tribe is from discarded tools and bones. In 1935 and 1936, Alvan T. Marston, a 65-year-old dentist and amateur archeologist from Clapham, discovered the remains of Swanscombe Man. The part of human skull belonged to an early form of modern man (Homo sapiens) and is believed to belong to a young woman. This skull can be seen in at the Natural History Museum in London. In August of 1955, the right parietal bone of the Swanscombe skull was found. It fitted perfectly with the parts that Marston found in 1935 and 1936. Lower layers of the Barnfield Pit revealed an even older, more primitive form of man living at Swanscombe earlier than 250,000 BP. The tribe was named Clactonian Man. The most common tool found at Swanscombe is the hand-axe. These were not common, everyday axes found in the local hardware shop, but very crude, simple tools. The axes were worked pieces of flint that were held in the hand and used Neanderthal Man, Cro-Magnon Man and Swanscombe Man are all now considered to be Homo sapiens. The skeletal features of these various finds are almost indistinguishable from modern man. They cannot be considered missing links because they are so similar to today's population. They were just different races that died roughly 100,000 years ago. These finds at Barnfield Pit, Swanscombe contradict previous beliefs and theory. Since the finds went against their contemporary timelines, archeologists had to rethink and reorganize the entire timeline to coincide with the new finds stating that there were modern-human like races 250,000 years ago and maybe even before. Unlike the Piltdown Man found in Britain, the Swanscombe Man was very real indeed, and it shattered the archeological community making the site one of the most rich Paleolithic sites in Britain and the world.
“A Mostly Complete Piltdown Man Bibliography.” Talk Origins Tom Turritin. http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/piltdown/piltref.html “Missing Links.” Gregory Koukl. Online commentary. http://www.str.org/free/commentaries/evolution/misslink.htm “Local History.” Mark Chatwin. Online. Jan. 1997. http://easyweb.easynet.co.uk/~mchatwin/localhst.htm
Written by: Luke Haeg