Forbidden Archeology_ The Full Unabridged Edition - Michael A. Cremo [227]
Taken together, the discoveries from the formations at Miramar and Mar del Sur, and other locations on the Argentine coast, are significant in that they show continuous habitation of the region by humans, from the Pliocene to recent historical times, with scarcely any change in the inhabitants’ mode of living.
Returning to the toxodon bones found at Miramar, we find that Carlos Ameghino anticipated accusations that the bones had worked their way into the Chapadmalalan formation from above. In his report he stated: “The bones are of a dirty whitish color, characteristic of this stratum, and not blackish, from the magnesium oxides in the Ensenadan” (C. Ameghino 1915, p. 442). This tended to rule out any suggestion that the toxodon bones had been mixed into the Chapadmalalan from upper beds of lesser age. Ameghino further pointed out that some of the hollow parts of the bones were filled with the Chapadmalalan loess. If the bones were derived from another level, one might expect them to be filled with a different kind of material. Of course, even if the bones had worked there way in from the Ensenadan, they would still be anomalously old. Dates for the Ensenadan range from 0.4 –1.0 million years (Marshall et al. 1982, p. 1352) to 0.4 –1.5 million years (Anderson 1984, p. 41).
In describing the nature of the loess in which the bones had been discovered, C. Ameghino (1915, p. 442) said: “The terrain surrounding these remains is a loess exceedingly fine and pulverized, a true aeolian loess, fairly well decalcified and of reddish grey tint, a loess which, as we have said, corresponds to the Chapadmalalan” (C. Ameghino 1915, p. 442). Furthermore, as we have seen (Section 5.2.1), a commission of geologists had confirmed that the Chapadmalalan beds at Miramar were intact, showing no signs of disturbance.
Those who want to dispute the great age attributed to the toxodon femur will nevertheless point out that the toxodon survived until just a few thousand years ago in South America. They will say: “Of course, these early researchers were often surprised to find evidence of a human presence in connection with remains of the toxodon, an animal they thought typical of the Pliocene or Miocene, but since that time scientists have discovered the truth—that the toxodon roamed South America until quite recently.” The clear implication is that if early researchers had been aware of this fact, they would certainly have hesitated to make claims for the great antiquity of humans based, for example, on the association of stone tools with toxodon bones.
But the fact that the toxodon lived until the Holocene does not rule out the discovery of toxodon bones in older strata, such as the Pliocene, for the toxodon definitely lived during that period. But the survival of the toxodon does allow critics to cast suspicion on finds such as Ameghino’s, despite the fact that such finds were made in clear stratigraphic contexts.
Early researchers were often aware that mammals characteristic of ancient strata persisted until recent times. This is certainly true of Carlos Ameghino (1915, p. 442), who reported that the toxodon he found at Miramar, an adult specimen, was smaller than those in the upper, more recent levels of the Pampean stratigraphic sequence. This indicated it was a distinct, older species. Carlos Ameghino (1915, p. 442) believed his Miramar toxodon was of the Chapadmalalan species Toxodon chapalmalensis, first identified by F. Ameghino, and characterized by its small size.
Furthermore, Carlos Ameghino (1915, p. 443) directly compared his Chapadmalalan toxodon femur with femurs of toxodon species from more recent Pampean formations and observed: “The femur of Miramar is on the whole smaller and more slender.” Ameghino then reported more details showing how the femur he found in the Late Pliocene Chapadmalalan of Miramar differed from that of Toxodon burmeisteri of more recent Pampean levels.
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