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but in situ deep within the preglacial Plateau drift gravels. This would tend to rule out the supposition that the implements were of fairly recent origin and had been dropped on the drift gravels by the later inhabitants of the Plateau region. Prestwich (1892, p. 251) stated: “A fine specimen was found at South Ash in making a hole two feet deep for planting a tree, but as it was picked up on the thrownout soil, its exact position beneath the surface remains of course uncertain. It was the same with the one obtained in a post-hole at Kingsdown. For two others we have, however, the personal testimony of Mr. Harrison. One he took out of a bank of the red-clay-with-flints on the side of a pond and at the depth of two and a half feet, and the other from a bed of ‘deep red clay,’ two feet in depth, at the Vigo.”

In a footnote to the above passage, Prestwich (1892, p. 251) went on to say: “Mr. Bullen has just had a trench dug on the top of Preston Hill. It was nearly five feet deep, through surface soil (one foot); and the red-clay-with-flints in which, at a depth of three feet ten inches from the surface, he found an unworn white flint—apparently the broken point of a small implement.” As we have seen, Edmunds (1954, p. 56) characterized major portions of the clay-with-flints deposits as remainié beds of Tertiary age, some Pliocene, some even Eocene.

3.2.5 The Relative Antiquity of Eoliths and Paleoliths

Returning to the eoliths found on the surface of the Plateau, Prestwich (1892, p. 252) asked: “could these implements, like the neolithic implements which occur on the same ground, have been dropped on the surface where they are now found, at some later date?” Although most of the Neolithic implements were found in the lower river terraces, some did occur on the Plateau. Prestwich (1892, p. 252) went on to state, in response to his own question: “The answer to this is, that these neolithic implements show only weathering by exposure on the surface, and are found at all levels, whereas the plateau implements, besides their wear and colour, present all the physical characteristics due to having been imbedded in a special drift, and are confined to a special area. The two sorts, although found on the same ground, remain perfectly distinguishable.”

Prestwich (1892, p. 252) then gave an extensive answer to an objection raised by Sir John Evans: “Then again, is it not possible that similar rude specimens occur in the valley drifts, and have been overlooked owing to the prevalence of the better finished implements to which attention had been exclusively given.” If eoliths were found in connection with the paleoliths or neoliths in the valleys, that might weaken Prestwich’s argument for their great age, which was based on the fact that they tended to be found only in the very ancient Plateau drifts. Prestwich (1892, p. 252) answered as follows: “A large number of rude and badly finished specimens have been collected in the valley drifts, but they all belong to one set of types, and though I have seen and handled many hundreds of these, I question whether, with the exception of the derived specimens [those washed down from the Plateau] to be named presently, there were any like the ruder and most primitive of the plateau types. The distinction is as well marked as that between the ruder specimens of Roman pottery and rude early British pottery.” Prestwich (1892, p. 252) went on to state: “Boucher de Perthes collected everything in the Somme district, which showed any traces of workmanship, howsoever indistinct, or even of similitude, yet I do not remember that in his great collection there were specimens of the peculiar character of these plateau implements.” In other words, the evidence from the Somme region confirmed Prestwich’s hypothesis that the Kent Plateau eoliths were of a distinct type, different from superficially similar crude implements of later periods. In a footnote, Prestwich (1892, p. 252) added: “I do have one specimen given me by M. Boucher de Perthes, from near St. Riquier, five miles north-east of Abbeville,