Glossary of Scientific and Difficult Terms Used in This Volume
Adjunctive, having the quality of joining.
Alluvial, pertaining to the deposits of sand, clay, or gravel, made by river action.
Amalgamate, to mix or blend different things or races.
Antero-posterior, in a direction from behind forward.
Aphelion, that point of a planet’s or comet’s orbit which is most distant from the sun.
Archæo-geologist, one versed in pre-historic remains, or familiar with both archæology and geology.
Archives, public records and papers preserved as evidence of fact.
Aryan, a term applied to all the nations who speak languages derived mainly from the Sanskrit, or ancient Hindoo.
Atomic, a system of philosophy which accounted for the origin and formation of all things by assuming that atoms are endowed with gravity and motion.
Auditory, having the power of hearing.
Baton, a staff used as an emblem of authority.
Brachycephalic, a skull whose transverse diameter exceeds the antero-posterior diameter.
Breccia, a rock made up of angular fragments cemented together.
Bronze, an alloy of copper, with from ten to thirty per cent. of tin, to which other metals are sometimes added.
Calcareous, consisting of, or containing, carbonate of lime.
Calcined, reduced to a powder, or friable state, by the action of heat.
Carbonate, a salt formed by the union of carbonic acid with a base.
Carnivora, an order of animals which subsist on flesh.
Carpal, that portion of the skeleton pertaining to the wrist.
Cataclysm, a deluge.
Celt, one of an ancient race of people who formerly inhabited a great part of Central and Western Europe; an implement made of stone or metal, found in the ancient tumuli of Europe.
Cereal, edible grain.
Champlain Epoch, a name derived from the beds on the borders of Lake Champlain. The beds are subsequent in origin to the glacial epoch.
Chert, an impure variety of flint.
Clavicle, the collar-bone.
Conglomerate, rock made of pebbles cemented together.
Coronoid, the process of the ulna and lower jaw.
Cosmogony, the science of the origin of the world or universe.
Cranium, the skull.
Crannoges, small islets in the lakes of Ireland and Scotland, used by the ancients as places of habitation.
Crucible, a vessel capable of enduring great heat, and used for melting ores, metals, etc.
Cyclical, pertaining to a periodical space of time marked by the recurrence of something peculiar.
Data (pl. of datum), a ground of inference or deduction.
Debris (dā-breé), fragments detached from rocks, and piled up in masses.
Demi-relief, the projection of one half the figure beyond the plane from which it rises.
Dendrites, a stone on which are tree-like markings.
Devonian, the geological age between the Silurian and Carboniferous.
Diluvium, the time when the glacial beds were deposited.
Diorite, a tough rock, in color whitish, speckled with black, or greenish black.
Dolichocephalic, a skull whose diameter from the frontal to the occipital bone exceeds the transverse diameter.
Dorsal, the name given to the second division of the vertebræ.
Drift, a collection of loose earth and bowlders, distributed during the glacial epoch over large portions of the earth’s surface.
Druidical, pertaining to the religious ceremonies of the ancient Celtic nations in France, Britain, and Germany.
Dynasty, a succession of kings of the same line or family.
Eccentricity, the distance of the centre of the orbit of a heavenly body from the centre of the body round which it revolves.
Edible, eatable.
Elliptical, having an oval or oblong figure.
Eocene, the oldest of the three epochs of the tertiary.
Epoch, any period of time marked by some particular cause or event.
Esplanade, a clear space, or grass plat.
Fauna, the animals of any given area or epoch.
Flora, the complete system of vegetable species native in a given locality, or period.
Fluor-spar, a mineral of beautiful colors, composed by fluorine and calcium.
Fluvio-marine, the deposits formed by the joint action of a river and the sea.
Foramen, a little opening.
Fossa, a depression in a bone.
Fossil, the form of a plant or animal in the strata composing the surface of the earth.
Genus (pl. genera), an assemblage of species possessing certain characters in common, by which they are distinguished from all others.
Geode, an irregular shaped stone, containing a small cavity.
Geognostic, pertaining to a knowledge of the structure of the earth.
Glabella, the middle or frontal protuberance of the superciliary arch.
Glaciation, the process of becoming covered with glaciers.
Glacier, an immense mass of ice, or snow and ice, formed in the region of perpetual snow, and moving slowly down mountain slopes or valleys.
Gneiss, a crystalline rock, consisting of quartz, feldspar, and mica.
Herbivora, that order of animals which subsists upon herbs or vegetables.
Homologous, having the same typical structure.
Humerus, the bone of the arm nearest the shoulder.
Hybrid, that which is produced from the mixture of two species.
Ilium, the upper part of the hip bone.
Jade, a hard and compact stone, of a dark green color, and capable of a fine polish.
Lambdoidal, the suture which connects the occipital with the parietal bones.
Leptinite, a fine-grained granitic rock.
Loam, a soil composed of siliceous sand, clay, carbonate of lime, oxide of iron, magnesia, and various salts, and also decayed vegetable and animal matter.
Loess, a term usually applied to a tertiary deposit on the banks of the Rhine.
Lumbar, the vertebræ near the loins.
Mammalia, that class of animals characterized by the female suckling its young.
Marl, a mixed earthy substance, consisting of carbonate of lime, clay, and siliceous sand.
Mastoid, a process situated at the posterior part of the temporal bone.
Matrix, a mould; the cavity in which a thing is held.
Maxillary, the upper jaw bone.
Metacarpal, the part of the hand between the wrist and the fingers.
Metallurgy, the art of working metals.
Metatarsal, the middle part of the foot.
Miocene, the middle or second epoch of the Tertiary.
Molar, a grinding tooth.
Mold, or mould, a prepared cavity used in casting; to form or shape; fine soft earth.
Mollusca, an order of invertebrate animals having a soft, fleshy body, which is inarticulate, and not radiate internally.
Moraine, a line of blocks and gravel extending along the sides of separate glaciers, and along the middle part of glaciers formed by the union of one or more separate ones.
Nebulous, having a faint, misty appearance; applied to uncondensed gaseous matter.
Neolithic, new stone age; a term applied to the more modern age of stone.
Nummulitic, composed of, or containing a fossil of a flattened form, resembling a small coin, and common in the early tertiary period.
Obsidian, a kind of glass produced by volcanoes.
Occipital, pertaining to the back part of the head.
Ochreous, consisting of fine clay, containing iron.
Olecranon, the large process at the extremity of the larger bone of the fore-arm.
Onusprobandi, the burden of proof.
Orbit, the cavity in which the eye is located; the path described by a heavenly body in its periodical revolution.
Osar, a low ridge of stone or gravel formed by glaciers.
Oscillation, the act of moving backward and forward.
Osseous, composed of bone.
Osteologist, one versed in the nature, arrangement, and uses of the bones.
Oxide, a compound of oxygen, and a base destitute of acid and saltish properties.
Pachyderm, a non-ruminant animal, characterized by the thickness of its skin.
Palæolithic, the ancient stone age; a term applied to the earliest traces of man when he was cotemporary with many extinct mammalia.
Palæontological, belonging to the science of the ancient life of the earth.
Parallelogram, a figure having four sides, the opposite sides of which are parallel, and consequently equal.
Parietal, pertaining to the bones which form the sides and upper part of the skull.
Pathological, pertaining to the knowledge of disease.
Pelvic, pertaining to the open, bony structure at the lower extremity of the body.
Perihelion, that point in the orbit of a planet, or comet, in which it is nearest to the sun.
Perimeter, the outer boundary of a body.
Phalanges, the small bones of the fingers and toes.
Philologist, one versed in the laws of human speech.
Pliocene, a term applied to the most recent tertiary deposits.
Post-Tertiary, the second period of the age of mammals.
Prototype, a model after which anything is to be copied.
Quadrangular, having four angles, and consequently four sides.
Quadrumana, an order of animals whose fore feet correspond to the hands of man.
Quartz, a stone of great hardness, with a glassy lustre, and varying in color from white, or colorless, to black.
Quartzite, granular quartz.
Quaternary, same as Post-Tertiary.
Radius, the smaller and exterior bone of the fore-arm.
Reliquiæ, remains of the dead.
Rhematic, that period when men first began to coin expressions for the most necessary ideas.
Rodent, an animal that gnaws.
Ruminant, an animal that chews the cud.
Sagittal, the suture which connects the parietal bones of the skull.
Savant (sä-vŏng), a person eminent for acquirements.
Scapula, the shoulder-blade.
Schist, a rock having a slaty structure.
Scientist, a person noted for his profound knowledge.
Sediment, the matter which subsides to the bottom.
Semitic, pertaining to one of the families of nations, or languages, and so named from its members being ranked as the descendants of Shem.
Serpentine, a soft, massive stone, in color dark to light green.
Siliceous, containing silica, or flinty matter.
Simian, a name given to the various tribes of monkeys.
Squamous, the anterior and upper part of the temporal bone, scale-like in form.
Stalagmite, a deposit of earthy matter, made by calcareous water dropping on the floors of caverns.
Stratified, formed or deposited in layers.
Stratum (pl. strata), a bed or layer.
Subsidence, the act of sinking or gradually descending.
Superciliary, the bony superior arch above the eye-brow.
Suture, the seam which unites the bones of the skull.
Symphysis, a connection of bones without a movable joint.
Talus, a sloping heap of fragments of rocks lying at the foot of a hill.
Tarsal, relating to the ankle.
Temporal, pertaining to that portion of the head located to the front and a little above the ear.
Terra-cotta, a kind of pottery made from fine clay, hardened by heat.
Tertiary, the first period of the age of mammals.
Thoracic, pertaining to the breast or chest.
Troglodyte, an inhabitant of a cave.
Truncated, cut off.
Tufaceous, consisting of, of resembling, tuff.
Tuff, a sand rock formed by agglutinated volcanic rock.
Turanian, that order of languages known as monosyllabic.
Ulna, the larger of the two bones of the fore-arm.
Veda, the ancient sacred literature of the Hindoos.
Vertebra, a joint of the back bone.
Footnotes
1 “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 2.
2 Buchner, p. 269.
3 “Man in the Past, Present, and Future,” p. 238.
4 “Antiquity of Man,” p. 68.
5 Discoveries of this kind were made in 1829.—Keller’s “Lake-Dwellings,” p. 11.
6 “Principles of Geology,” vol. i. p. 286.
7 “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 418.
8 “Manual of Geology,” p. 590.
9 “Antiquity of Man,” pp. 282, 285.
10 “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 417.
11 Principles of Geology, vol. i. p. 285; “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 411.
Mr. Croll believes that, owing to variations in the eccentricity of the earth’s orbit “cold periods regularly recur every ten or fifteen thousand years; but that at much longer intervals the cold, owing to certain contingencies, is extremely severe, and lasts for a great length of time; and the last great glacial period occurred about two hundred and forty thousand years ago, and endured with slight alterations of climate for about one hundred and sixty thousand years.”—Darwin’s Origin of Species, p. 343.
12 It would be plausible to assume that the ice melted much more rapidly than is generally supposed. Charles Darwin, in his “Naturalist’s Voyage around the World,” p. 245, states that “during one very dry and long summer, all the snow disappeared from Aconcagua, although it attains the prodigious height of twenty-three thousand feet. It is probable that much of the snow at these great heights is evaporated, rather than thawed.”
13 “Principles of Geology,” vol. ii, pp. 567-569.
14 Buchner, p. 118
15 “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 362.
16 “Antiquity of Man,” p. 97; “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 315.
17 The “Science Record” for 1874, p. 501, in speaking of these implements says, “At the very lowest estimate, the flint weapons were made half a million years ago.”
18 “Antiquity of Man,” p. 98. “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 317.
19 “Antiquity of Man,” p. 338; Buchner, 27.
20 “Antiquity of Man,” p. 510; Buchner, p. 27.
21 Buchner, pp. 118, 306.
22 Buchner, p. 239.
23 “Principles,” vol. ii, p. 566.
24 “Antiquity of Man,” p. 63.
25 It has been estimated by the British Association that it requires twenty thousand years to produce a foot of stalagmite.—Science Record. 1874, p. 601.
26 “Principles,” vol. ii, p. 527.
27 “Man’s Place in Nature,” p. 146.
28 “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 337.
29 “Antiquity of Man,” p. 80.
30 “Man’s Place in Nature,” p. 143.
31 “Antiquity of Man,” p. 80.
32 Buchner, p. 263.
33 Ibid. p. 262.
34 “Man’s Place in Nature,” p. 158.
35 Buchner, p. 241.
36 Buchner, p. 240.
37 Ibid. p. 241.
38 “Man’s Place in Nature,” p. 164.
39 Buchner, p. 116.
40 “Antiquity of Man,” p. 84.
41 Ibid., p. 53.
42 “Antiquity of Man,” p. 84.
43 Buchner, p. 54.
44 Buchner, p. 242.
45 Denton’s “Our Planet,” p. 270.
46 Buchner, p. 265.
47 Ibid., p. 54.
48 Ibid., p. 242.
49 “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 422.
50 Ibid., p. 423.
51 Wallace’s “Natural Selection, p. 322.”
52 Buchner, pp. 34, 252.
53 Buchner, p. 242.
54 Buchner, p. 31; “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 420.
55 Buchner, p. 33; “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 421.
56 Denton’s “Our Planet,” p. 270; “American Phrenological Journal, Feb.” 1874.
Having seen the statement in one of the newspapers that this skull was not genuine, but a joke played on Professor Whitney, I wrote to Professor W. Denton of Wellesley, Masschussetts, on 19th March 1875, inquiring about it. A few days later I received from him the statement that he had visited the place where the skull was found; that certain persons assured him that Professor Whitney had been the victim of a joke. Yet these persons had never seen the skull, and were prejudiced against Professor Whitney. The persons who were best informed had every reason to believe the statements made by Professor Whitney were true. The skull is a very remarkable one, and stands alone for the enormous size of the orbits, and I have good reasons to believe it to have been found as stated.
57 “Several geologists are convinced, from direct evidence, that glacial periods occurred during the miocene and eocene formations, not to mention still more ancient formations.”—Darwin’s Origin of Species, p. 343.
58 “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 421; Buchner, 32.
59 “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 422.
60 Buchner, p. 32.
61 “American Phrenological Journal,” Feb. 1874.
62 Buchner, p. 274.
63 “Our Planet,” p. 266.
64 “Science Record,” 1874, p. 499.
65 “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 315.
66 “Origin of Civilization,” p. 121.
67 Figuier’s “Primitive Man,” p. 116.
68 Buchner, p. 248.
69 Buchner, p. 247; “Keller’s Lake-Dwellings.”
70 “Lake-Dwellings,” pp. 37, 334, 350, 360.
71 “Lake-Dwellings,” p. 394.
72 “Lake-Dwellings,” p. 396.
73 “Primitive Man,” p. 219.
74 “Primitive Man,” p. 293.
75 “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 76.
76 “Primitive Man,” p. 200.
77 “Lake Dwellings,” p. 319.
78 “Pre-Historic Times,” p. 218; “Primitive Man,” p. 281.
79 “Lake-Dwellings,” p. 400.
80 “Science Record,” p. 564. 1875.
81 “American Phrenological Journal,” February, 1874.
82 Wilson’s “Pre-Historic Man,” p. 40.
83 “Pre-Historic Man,” p. 46.
84 “Antiquity of Man,” p. 200; “Principles of Geology,” vol. i. p. 454.
85 “Antiquity of Man,” p. 43; “Pre-Historic Man,” p. 47.
86 “Antiquity of Man,” p. 44.
87 “Primitive Man,” pp. 9, 77.
88 “Pre-Historic Man,” p. 236.
89 “Ancient Monuments,” p. 304.
90 Buchner, p. 35.
91 Rollin, vol. i. p. 138.
92 Anthon’s Classical Dictionary, p. 788.
93 Buchner, 254.
94 “New York Tribune”, June 6, 1874.
95 Rawlinson’s Herodotus, vol. ii. p. 189.
96 “Principles of Geology,” vol. i. p. 432.
97 “Antiquity of Man,” p. 36.
98 Bayard Taylor in “New York Tribune, Extra,” No. 15.
99 “Pre-Historic Nations,” p. 190.
100 Ibid. pp. 178, 175.
101 “Pre-Historic Nations,” p. 37.
102 “Ancient America,” p. 187.
103 “Chips from a German Workshop,” vol. i. p. 21.
104 Ibid. vol. ii. p. 8.
105 Wake’s “Chapters on Man,” p. 33.
106 “Diodorus Siculus, Lucretius, Horace, and many other Greek and Roman writers, consider language as one of the arts invented by man. The first men, say they, lived for some time in woods and caves, after the manner of beasts, uttering only confused and indistinct noises, till, associating for mutual assistance, they came by degrees to use articulate sounds mutually agreed upon, for the arbitrary signs or marks of those ideas in the mind of the speaker which he wanted to communicate to the hearer. This opinion sprung from the atomic cosmogony which was framed by Mochus, the Phœnician, and afterward improved by Democritus and Epicurus.”—Pouchet’s Plurality of the Human Race, p. 142.
107 “Principles of Geology,” vol. ii. p. 475. “It is generally acknowledged that all organic beings have been formed on two great laws—Unity of Type, and the Conditions of Existence. By unity of type is meant that fundamental agreement in structure which we see in organic beings of the same class, and which is quite independent of their habits of life. On my theory, unity of type is explained by unity of descent.”—Darwin’s Origin of Species, p. 200.
108 I put myself into clothes.
109 Shepherd.
110 And.
111 Wonder.
112 “Descent of Man,” vol. i. p. 143.
113 Mivart’s “Genesis of Species,” p. 114.
114 “Origin of Species,” p. 193.
115 “Descent of Man,” vol. i. p. 142.
116 “Chips,” vol. i. pp. 63, 62.
117 Lady Belcher’s “Mutineers of the Bounty,” p. 61.
118 “Captain Cook found on the island of Wateoo, three inhabitants of Otaheite, who had been drifted thither in a canoe, although the distance between the two isles is five hundred and fifty miles. In 1696, two canoes, containing thirty persons, who had left Ancorso, were thrown by contrary winds and storms on the Island of Samar, one of the Philippines, at a distance of eight hundred miles. In 1721, two canoes, one of which contained twenty-four, and the other six persons, men, women, and children, were drifted from an island called Farroilep to the island of Guaham, one of the Marians, a distance of two hundred miles.” Kadu, a native of Ulea, and three of his countrymen, while sailing in a boat, were driven out to sea by a violent storm, and drifted about the sea for eight months, subsisting entirely on the produce of the sea, and finally were picked up in an insensible condition by the inhabitants of Aur (Caroline Isles) one thousand five hundred miles distant from his native isle.—Principles of Geology, vol. ii. p. 472.
119 “Natural History of Man,” vol. i. p. 16.
120 Powell’s “Human Temperaments,” p. 180.
121 The idea that “bara” meant to create out of nothing is a modern invention, and most likely called forth by the contact between Jews and Greeks at Alexandria. The Greeks believed that matter was co-eternal with the Creator, and it was probably in contradistinction to this notion that the Jews first asserted that God made all things out of nothing. The word, however, only calls forth the simple conception of fashioning or arranging.—Chips, vol. i. p. 132.
122 “Testimony of the Rocks,” Fifth Lecture.
123 Rev. Dr. J. P. Thompson represents Adam as a typical man (Man in Genesis and Geology, p. 105); Lubbock regards him as a typical savage (Origin Civilization, p. 361). Why not call him the first great prototype of the human race?
124 The word Nod means to wander, to be driven about, etc. It appears to have been a familiar name at the time of the fratricide. It was then the name of a land or tract of country. May there not have been roving tribes there, and from them the place was designated “Wandering Land”?
125 Dr. Livingstone, after speaking of a half-caste man on the Zambesi, described by the Portuguese as a rare monster of humanity, “remarks, ‘It is unaccountable why half-castes, such as he, are so much more cruel than the Portuguese, but such is undoubtedly the case.’ An inhabitant remarked to Livingstone, ‘God made white men, and God made black men, but the devil made half castes.’ When two races, both low in the scale, are crossed, the progeny seem to be eminently bad. Thus the noble-hearted Humboldt speaks in strong terms of the bad and savage disposition of Zambos, or half-castes between Indians and Negroes; and this conclusion has been arrived at by various observers. From these facts we may perhaps infer that the degraded state of so many half-castes is in part due to reversion to a primitive and savage condition, as well as to the unfavorable moral conditions under which they generally exist.”—Animals and Plants under Domestication, vol. ii. p. 63.
126 This view does not conflict with the doctrine of the unity of the race. The great difficulty in interpreting the Scriptures is its briefness. A long period of time is comprehended in a very few words, and much is left to inference. The tenor of the Scriptures favors the idea of the unity of the race, still it is not specifically declared. The strongest passage is Acts chapter 17 and verse 26: “Hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth.” This does not conflict with the idea of there being more than one pair, but their blood is the same. It is not declared that Adam had no ancestors. When it is declared that Adam was the son of God, it is only to trace man’s origin to the Supreme Being. If Adam had ancestors, the leaving of them out has no signification, as it was not uncommon to drop the name of unimportant persons. An instance of this kind is given in the genealogy of David. From the birth of Obed to the birth of his grandson David (common chronology) is a period of two hundred and twenty-three years. Evidently one or more members have been dropped. If Adam was a prototype it was not necessary to trace the line any farther back. The forming him of the dust of the ground would give his relationship to the rest of mankind. He was chosen, endowed for the purpose of elevating the race—of becoming the head of a new type of humanity.
127 The Septuagint version is a translation of the Hebrew Bible into Greek, made about three hundred years B. C. The oldest existing MS. of the Old Testament in Hebrew dates back no farther than about the tenth century after the Christian era—Chips. vol. i. p. 11.
128 “Primeval Man,” p. 86.
129 “Primeval Man,” p. 87.
130 “Primeval World of Hebrew Tradition,” p. 195.
131 “Primeval World of Hebrew Tradition,” p. 222.