The following notes are the outcome of observations made several years ago. It is hoped that they may arouse the interest of some who will be tempted to pursue the enquiry with more definite results.

Briefly, my observations seem to show that the earthworks and stones in question extending from Harleston to Gorleston are of prehistoric date, perhaps of the same cycle as the stone circles of Stonehenge, Avebury, Stenness, and elsewhere, and, like them, designed, by a series of alignments with outlying monoliths, for solar and stellar observations—in the present case chiefly of the sun's rising and setting at the period of its greatest amplitude, viz., at the summer and winter solstices. Such astronomical considerations have been very fully considered by Sir Norman Lockyer. To his work, “Stonehenge and other British Monuments astronomically considered” (Macmillan, 1906), I am indebted for the clue which led me to the subject of these notes, and to this work I refer the reader for a vast amount of evidence parallel with that which I am now offering.

The view that Grime's Graves and similar flint-mines belonged to a part of the Neolithic age, some archæologists considering them early and others late, was not seriously challenged until Mr. Reginald Smith in “Archæologia” (Vol. LXIIL), and in the “Report on the Excavations at Grime's Graves, 1914,” drew attention to the remarkable parallels between the flint industry of Grime's Graves, and that of the transitional period between Moustier and Aurignac of which the typical site is Abri Audi. To many that evidence has seemed conclusive, but while I recognise how excellent a case for a “Cave” date may be made from the implements alone, I yet feel that, viewing all the available facts, there is still much to be said for considering such flint-mines Neolithic. This is the view held by some at least of our continental confreres who are well acquainted with implements from Mousterian and Aurignacian deposits, and those from flint-mines similar to Grime's Graves, and they still place the latter in the Neolithic age.

It may seem a paradox, but it is nevertheless true, that more is known of the remote Palæolithic period than of the later Stone Age that ended about 4000 years ago. This applies to the Continent as well as to Britain, but Scandinavia is exceptional, and for our present purpose the best subject of investigation. The accepted view is that the three Baltic kingdoms were uninhabited in Quaternary times, and could only be approached by man after the last, or Baltic, glaciation had come to an end. There are certain facts inexplicable on that hypothesis, but all will agree that the Neolithic period in that area can be divided into early and late divisions; and so rich are the prehistoric remains and so advanced is this study, that the Scandinavian system can be used as a touch-stone by which to test the facts and theories of our own later Stone Age. I propose, therefore, on the present occasion to deal in some detail with the latest results of Scandinavian research, and then to proceed in order with the districts that face us across the North Sea and the Channel—North-west Germany, Holland, Belgium, and Northern France. It is hoped that such a survey will enable a more rigid classification to be made of the large amount of British material referred to the Neolithic period. In this country one has to rely mainly on form, but in Scandinavia that element is combined with others, such as habitation-sites, shell-mounds, and megalithic remains that furnish proof of the succession of forms, and open up the question of relations with Britain at that early date. If the claims already made on that head be valid, then comparisons become possible, and certain stages at least of the period in question can be arranged on scientific lines.

The object of this paper is to give an account of the various diggings which have been carried on beneath the base of the Red Crag of Suffolk by means of money grants from the Royal Society of London, and to accurately describe and figure the further flint implements of man which have been discovered in the sub-crag detritus bed, since the appearance of Sir Ray Lankester's memoir in the Philosophical Transactions (series B., Vol. 202, pp. 283–336) and to show by such a description that a series of flaked flints have now been recovered constituting a true Pliocene human “culture.”

An account will also be given of the characteristics of these newly-discovered implements, and the conclusions which may be legitimately drawn from them regarding their past history and its bearing upon the deposit in which they are found.

The excavations which have been conducted and which have resulted in these new discoveries being made, extended over the period intervening between April, 1912, and November, 1913, and were carried out at the following places:—Tattingstone Hall Farm, Tattingstone; Thorington Hall, Wherstead; The Back Hamlet, Ipswich; Messrs. Bolton and Laughlin's brickfield, Ipswich; The Nursery, Martlesham; Pettistree and Sutton Hall Farms, near Woodbridge; and the Valley Farm, Boyton, near Woodbridge.