Salvador Arana Calderon

“ It is also important to bear in mind that remains of the mammoth have been found in various parts of Spain—in the caverns of the Pyrenees, in the centre in Madrid, and in the south near the shores of the Mediterranean, a position further south than Home, which has generally been considered the southern limit of the tract in in which the bones of this animal are found. The same may be said of the Rhinoceros tichorhinus, which has, without doubt, been discovered in two different places in the north of the Peninsula. ”

“ No objects of flint have been found similar to those collected by the Abbé Bourgeois, which gave rise to the supposition that man may have existed in the Tertiary period.
It is only in modern times that the caverns of this country have been explored, thanks to the late Don Casiano de Prado, who, in his memoir upon the geology of the province of Madrid, published an appendix containing a list of all the caverns of Spain known to him. ”

“ Whatever may be our opinion upon the theory of the specific centres which individual organic forms may have taken as their point of departure, it will always be of advantage to the student to find in every locality the prehistoric ancestors of its fauna; to use the comparison of Lyell, the connexion between the present and the fossil forms, particularly in the case of the Mammalia, is the same as that between the different dialects which proceed from one primitive language. ”

“ For example, the migrations of quadrupeds, which have caused the formation, in the greater part of Europe, of deposits of remains at a considerable distance from each other, must have been difficult in the Peninsula from the most remote time, and this has given rise to certain peculiarities in our mammalian fauna. ”

“ The investigations in Spain are important when viewed with reference to the subject of extinction of species, particularly those that were contemporary with man in the period termed by Lubbock Palæolithic, and which is marked by the existence of animals that have since disappeared. ”

“ Argerilla, cavern in the province of Guadalajara (Vilanova) ; bone deposits of Castile (Gil Maestre) .
Hyæna, Storr.
Concud, in the province of Teruel (Maestre) ; cave of Congostrina, in the province of Guadalajara (Prado) ; caverns of Guipuzcoa (Larrimia) .
H. spelæa, Goldf.—Province of Segovia (Prado) .
H. brunnea, Thunb.—Gibraltar (Busk and Falconer) .
Hyænictis, Gaudry.
H. græca? Gaudry.—Concud (Vilanova) .
Felis, L.
F. leopardus, L.—Cavern of Gibraltar (Busk and Falconer) .
F. lynx, L.—Cavern of Gibraltar (Busk and Falconer.)
Machairodus, Kaup.
Madrid (Prado) . ”