Flints from Piltdown, Sussex

These flints were found in a gravel pit at Piltdown in Sussex by Charles Dawson (1864-1916), a local solicitor and amateur archaeologist. The gravel pit was the same one in which the now infamous Piltdown Man was discovered. It is widely believed that Dawson was responsible for this audacious fraud.


BGS image ID: P903735

BGS image ID: P903736

BGS Image ID: P903738

BGS has a Piltdown Forgery webpage and timeline which can be accessed here

Andrew L Morrison

Searching for Palaeolithic implements, Milton Street Gravel Pits, Kent. 1908.

Caption: Workmen with rods for searching for Palaeolithic implements, Milton Street Gravel Pits, Kent. T.W. Reader 23.5.08. [1908]

Caption: Some members examining the Flint Implement collection of Mr. Treacher.  [Llewellyn Treacher] T.R.W. 25.6.10 [1910]

Photographs are from the Geologists' Association 'Carreck Archive' on deposit at the British Geological Survey.

Bob McIntosh