Samuel Hazzledine Warren and the construction of a chronologicalframework for the British Quaternary in the early twentieth century

Anne O'Connor

O'CONNOR, A. 2006. Samuel Hazzledine Warren and the construction of a chronologicalframework for the British Quaternary in the early twentieth century. Proceedings of theGeologists' Association, 117.41-52. Samuel Hazzledine Warren (1872-1958), a geologist fromEssex. made a critical contribution to British Quaternary research in the first half of thetwentieth century. His role has been overshadowed by the more prestigious schemes of his peersand is largely forgotten today. However, Warren's archaeological and geological observations,particularly his work at Clacton-on-Sea, assisted the efforts made by his more celebratedcontemporaries to construct a reliable chronological framework for the British Quaternary. Hisresearch on the Clacton Channel and his discovery of the Clactonian industry complementedthe archaeological scheme developed by Henri Breuil in the 1930s and the geological stagescreated by King and Oakley for the Lower Thames Valley in 1936. Warren worked at aparticularly interesting time in the history of geology. He observed the rise in prominence ofearly palaeolithic industries as chronological markers, witnessed their influence on geologicalinterpretations in the 1930s, and experienced the troubles which ensued when this chronologicalaid fell from grace in the 1940s and 1950s.

Key words: history of geology, Quaternary, Palaeolithic, Clactonian, chronology

Department of Archaeology. University of Durham, South Road. Durham DHI 3LE, UK(e-mail: anne.o.connor@durham.ae.uk)

1. INTRODUCTION

In the early years of the twentieth century SamuelHazzledine Warren (I872~1958) of Loughton, Essex,began working on Quaternary exposures which hadbeen revealed by marine erosion around Clacton-on­Sea [TM 180150]. This was a time of some uncertaintyfor Warren and his peers. Although the rich fluviatiledeposits lying in valleys such as the Thames andSomme supplied the means to construct a variety ofelaborate schemes, Quaternary stratigraphy was noto­riously complex. There had also been complaints thatthe Palaeolithic was attracting little attention in Britaincompared to the efforts of Continental researchers(Sturge, 1908; Boule, 1915). Over the next few decades,detailed geological and industrial chronologies wouldbe developed by the familiar figures of Reginald Smithand Henry Dewey, William King and Kenneth Oakley,Victor Commont and Henri Breuil. However, theobservations of Hazzledine Warren also played acritical part in the construction of a chronologicalframework for the British Quaternary.

A word on terminology. Warren had no formaltraining or paid employment in geology. He might be

This work is one of a set of papers arising from a jointmeeting of the Geological Society of London History ofGeology Group and the Geologists' Association. TheAmateur in British Geology, held at The Geological Society,Burlington House, London, 14-15 March, 2002.

Proceedings uf the Geologists' Association. 117.41-52.

regarded as an 'amateur' if he was working today, aterm which can imply a lack of competence. However,Warren gained the reputation of a cautious and carefulgeologist who worked to exacting standards (Roe,1981, p. 24). He was regarded by most of his contem­poraries as thoroughly 'professional' in his approach.Many of his peers were also non-professionals; forthem, this professional/amateur distinction was lessimportant than it might be today. It was then morecommon to distinguish between two kinds of collec­tors, particularly amongst those interested in theBritish Palaeolithic: collectors of artefacts and thosewho also collected detailed information about thecontext of their finds (Hinton & Kennard, 1905).Samuel Hazzledine Warren was undoubtedly one ofthe latter. A final note: although Warren describedhimself as a geologist, palaeolithic research was asmuch a geological as an archaeological province in theearlier years of the twentieth century.

This short paper explores the geological andarchaeological research carried out by Warren atClacton-on-Sea and his role in the Quaternary debatesof the early twentieth century. Warren's contributionhas been largely forgotten today, with a few notableexceptions (Bridgland, 1994; McNabb, 1996; White,2000). However, his findings were acknowledged andincorporated within many of the more celebratedschemes of his contemporaries. Several of the promi­nent Quaternary frameworks developed in the mid­twentieth century were influenced by the belief that

0016-7878/06 $15.00 '0 2006 Geologists' Association

42 A. O'CONNOR

Fig. 1. 'Lion Point 2 mit Mr & Mrs. Warren' (Zeuner, 22 April 1937: UCL: Zeuner Diary 2, p. 12). Reproduced courtesy ofthe Institute of Archaeology, University College, London.

palaeolithic industries could be used as time-markers(or 'zone-fossils') to help arrange and interpret theconfusing fluviatile and glacial deposits of southernEngland. Warren's palaeolithic industry from Clacton­on-Sea and the links which were made between thegeology of Clacton and the Thames Valley played animportant part in these constructions.

2. WARREN AND illS WORK ATCLACTON-ON-8EA

Samuel Hazzledine Warren (Figs. I and 2), the onlychild of Steven Warren and Hannah Mary Hazzledine,was born in Hertfordshire in 1872. Around 1903,Warren married, moved to Essex and retired from thefamily business of wholesale provision merchants(Oakley, 1959). He entered his early thirties with thetime and money to devote the rest of his life toQuaternary geology and prehistoric archaeology; whenhe died at the age of eighty-five in 1958, Warren left anestate worth around £25 000. His first paper waspublished in 1897: 'Note on a Section of thePleistocene Rubble Drift near Portslade, Sussex'.Warren sent his last paper to the Geologists'Association only two months before his death:'The Clacton Flint Industry: A Supplementary Note'(Warren, 1897, 1958).

Warren would have been a familiar figure aroundthe Essex countryside with his Abney level and 'elab­orately fitted expedition car' (Warren, 1932a; Godwin,1958, p. 1241). He journeyed around his adoptedcounty and roamed further afield: collecting from anddescribing a vast number of temporary exposures,worried about the loss of unrecorded data. Warren

also set aside a week or two each year to work onthe famous Quaternary deposits of Clacton-on-Sea(Oakley, 1959). Publications, records and collections ofearlier workers were examined, checked against new

Fig. 2. Samuel Hazzledine Warren (1872-1958) at work in hisold clothes, taken just before the Second World War (NHMArchives, DF14017). © The Natural History Museum,London.

HAZZLEDINE WARREN AND THE BRITISH QUATERNARY CHRONOLOGY 43

After de Martillet (1900, p. 241).

Table 1. De Mortillet's Early Palaeolithic industrial sequence.

temporary exposures at Clacton, and incorporatedwithin his own geological interpretations (Warren,1923, 1924a). Warren soon became known as an experton the geology of this area: he was often visited by hisgeological peers and enjoyed showing them over theground. But Clacton-on-Sea was not only geologicallyinteresting; it also yielded a palaeolithic industry whichwould provoke much argument amongst Warren'scontemporaries.

By the time that Warren was beginning his investi­gations in Essex, British researchers had started todescribe their palaeolithic industries using the termspopularized by Gabriel de Mortillet (1821-1898), theFrench prehistorian (Evans, 1897, p. 482). Table 1provides a brief summary of de Mortillet's scheme.This ran from a debated Eolithic (a pre-Palaeolithicphase which need not concern us here), to the hand-axeindustries of the Chellean and Acheulian, and on tothe Mousterian which was dominated by flake-tools(Mortillet, 1900, p. 241). Some of Warren's contem­poraries, however, argued that the British Quaternarydeposits exhibited far more industrial variation thancould be described by this French classification(Sturge, 1908, 1911; Woodward, 1909, p. 78; Abbott,1911). An assemblage of stone tools found by Warrenat C1acton-on-Sea added to the list of curious indus­tries which were difficult to position within thestandard palaeolithic picture.

The Rev. James Wright Kenworthy, Vicar ofBraintree, had noted the presence of artefacts in theQuaternary exposures at Clacton-on-Sea in 1898(Warren, 1932a). Warren began to gather this palaeo­lithic industry a decade later, and gradually amassed alarge collection of these crude stone tools and flakesfrom the eroding foreshore exposures (Oakley &Leakey, 1937; Warren, 1951). He obtained a particu­larly large series between 1911 and 1916 and publishedhis first brief account of the 'Palaeolithic Remainsfrom Clacton-on-Sea' in 1912 (Warren, 1912a, 1922).However, Warren was too cautious to assign any labelto his discovery.

Through the nineteenth and well into the twentiethcentury, the interpretation and classification of palaeo­lithic industries was characterized by three recurringstrategies. First, the identification of typologically­attractive shaped (or 'retouched') tools such as thehand-axe which formed the basis of many industrialdefinitions. Second, the common assumption thatworkmanship grew more skilled through time. Third,the widespread distinction between industries in which

Industry

MousterianAcheulianChellean

Description

Flake tools, fine retouchFine hand-axes, skilfully madeLarge, crude hand-axes, simple technique

stone tools were made on a core or nodule of flint(core-tools), and those dominated by flakes struckfrom this core (flakes and flake-tools). The Chelleanand Acheulian, with their typologically distinctivehand-axes (widely regarded as core-tools) were per­ceived to be different in kind from the Mousterian,which was dominated by flakes and flake-tools.

At Clacton-on-Sea, Warren had been presented withwhat he believed was a flake-dominated industry; buthe also recognized the presence of undeniable core­tools in this assemblage. None the less, he firmlydistinguished this industry from the Chellean andAcheulian, observing in 1912 that 'not a single exampleof the usual ovate or pointed Palaeolithic types has yetbeen found' (Warren, 1912a, p. 15). This was not ahand-axe industry; but it could not easily be assignedto the Mousterian either: the associated fauna did notinclude beasts common to Mousterian times and theindustrial technique was different. In one paper, War­ren drew attention to the stratigraphical evidence,which suggested a post-Mousterian date; in another,he hinted at the early (pre-Chellean) character of thisindustry (Warren, 1912a, b). The industrial affinities ofhis Clacton-on-Sea artefacts would remain an enigmato Warren until the early 1920s (Warren, 1922).

3. COMMONT AND THE PALAEOLITHICSEQUENCE OF THE 1910S

Meanwhile, the concerns of British researchers regard­ing the French palaeolithic scheme were beginning tosubside. Recent work by Victor Commont (1866-1918)in the Somme Valley, North France, had produced amore respectable refinement of de Mortillet's basicindustrial sequence. Commont was a self-taught geol­ogist, palaeontologist and prehistorian: he carried outhis research in time spared from his work as professorof sciences at the Ecole Normale at Amiens (Reinach,1919). His detailed accounts of the geology and theearly palaeolithic industries of the Somme Valley,which began to appear in 1906, were welcomed bythose who were trying to make sense of the BritishQuaternary record (Sturge, 1911; Underwood, 1912;Dewey 1913, 1919).

Commont's work inspired one of the most famousgeological/archaeological collaborations in the historyof early twentieth-century palaeolithic research: the1912 and 1913 excavations of Smith and Dewey in theThames Valley. Whilst Warren was publishing his firstarticle on the industry from Clacton-on-Sea, ReginaldSmith (1874-1940), an Assistant Keeper at the BritishMuseum, and Henry Dewey (1876-1965), a Geologistat the Geological Survey, began working on pitsaround Swanscombe. Most notable amongst these wasthe Barnfield pit [TQ 598746], which yielded largenumbers of palaeolithic artefacts. Sadly, their briefcollaboration ended in December 1913 when theGeological Survey informed the British Museum thatthe Swanscombe area no longer fell within Dewey's

44 A.O·CONNOR

Table 2. The Early Palaeolithic industrial sequences of Commont (1912) and Smith &. Dewey (1913, 1914).

The industrial succession of the Somme Valley(Commont. 1912)

'Acheuleen superieur': pointed hand-axes

'Acheuleen inferieur': oval hand-axesdominate'Chelleen evolue': fine triangular hand-axes'Chelleen typique': large, coarse hand-axesPre-Chellean: crude hand-axe prototypes

The industrial succession of the Thames Valley, based on the Swanscombesequence (Smith & Dewey, 1913, 1914)

St Acheul I and II, possibly from the base of the Upper Loam: finelymade ovate hand-axes

Chellean from the Middle Gravel: rough, pointed hand-axes

Strepyan / pre-Chellean from the Lower Gravel: dominated by flakes; afew nodules (Strepy points)

official surveying territory (Barrow to Strahan, 19December 1913: BGS: GSM2/544). Smith and Dewey'sinterpretations were heavily influenced by the work ofVictor Commont (see Table 2), although they pro­tested that they were describing a local sequence andthe evidence had not 'been twisted into agreement withsupposed parallels elsewhere' (Smith & Dewey, 1913,p. 196; also noted by McNabb, 1996).

In retrospect, it is very interesting to discoverthat Victor Commont remained unconvinced by whatbecame a classic industrial sequence:

a Swanscombe, a Barnfield, peut-etre que M.Smith a des tendranees a etablir trop de subdivi­sions dans les alluvions de la terrasse au 100 ft.(Commont to Sollas, 1 January 1913: BGS:GSM 1/445).at Swanscombe, at Barnfield, perhapsMr. Smith has a tendency to establish too manysub-divisions in the deposits of the 100 ft terrace.

None the less, the co-authored publications of Smithand Dewey succeeded in establishing a standardsequence of pre-Chellean, Chellean, Acheulian, andMousterian industries - not just for the ThamesValley; but for the whole of Britain (Smith & Dewey,1913,1914; Kennard, 1916; Bury, 1923; Oakley, 1939).

4. PROBLEMATIC PALAEOLITHICINDUSTRIES

Let us now return to the enigmatic industry whichWarren had been collecting from the Clacton foreshoreand explore a similarly perplexing discovery made bySmith and Dewey in the older deposits of Barnfield pit,Swanscombe. Smith and Dewey, unlike Warren, madea determined attempt to affix an industrial label totheir crude, flake-dominated, assemblage - which, theyremarked, 'was rather a surprise both as to its quantityand quality' (Smith & Dewey, 1913, p. 182). No linkappears to have been made to the Clacton industry;Smith and Dewey may have been unaware of Warren'sarticle in the Essex Naturalist for 1912, and his com­ments to the Geological Society about the Clactondeposits in these early years referred only briefly to the

stone tools. However, it is also worth noting thatSmith might not have desired a connection withWarren: he disapproved of Warren's anti-eolithic pub­lications and kept to a small circle of 'approvedfriends' (Kendrick, 1971, pp. 4-5).

This surprising Swanscombe industry came from theLower Gravel, where it lay beneath the hand-axe-richdeposits of the Middle Gravel (see Table 2 above). Inthe terminology of the time, the industry of the LowerGravel might therefore be termed 'pre-Chellean'. How­ever, Smith and Dewey did not stop there, for theywere evidently troubled by the lack of distinctiveretouched core-implements in this industry. They alsoattempted to identify some form of diagnostic imple­ment, and this led them to draw a tentative parallelbetween a few crudely chipped nodules and the'Strepyan'. The Strepyan was one of the early palaeo­lithic industries which had been identified in Belgiumby Aime Rutot (1847-1933), curator at the NaturalHistory Museum of Brussels. Like Rutot, Smith andDewey believed that these 'Strepy points' were precur­sors of the Chellean hand-axes (Rutot, 1903). Theyconcluded that the industry from the SwanscombeLower Gravel was a Strepyan or pre-Chellean industryanalogous to the pre-Chellean described by Commont.Incidentally, whilst the terms 'Strepyan' and 'pre­Chellean' were often used interchangeably in Britain,Commont rarely referred to the Belgian industries(Sollas, 1911, p. 107; Smith, 1912).

Warren had to wait until the 1920s before he wasfinally presented with a label for his industry: the'Mesvinian', a term which was derived from another ofRutot's Belgian industries. This suggestion was madeby the Abbe Henri Breuil (1877-1961), Professor ofPrehistoric Ethnography at the Institut de Paleontolo­gie Humaine in Paris, and it was gladly accepted byWarren. (For the sake of clarity, it is worth noting thatthe industry from Clacton-on-Sea was only termed the'Mesvinian' for a few years and soon became morecommonly known as the 'Clactonian' (Warren, 1926).)In the early 1920s, Rutot's Mesvinian was generallyconsidered to date to 'some part of the Acheulianstage, or possibly a little earlier' (Warren, 1922, p. 602;see also Rutot, 1921). Warren's industry thus appeared

HAZZLEDINE WARREN AND THE BRITISH QUATERNARY CHRONOLOGY 45

to be the contemporary of, rather than a precursor to,the hand-axe industries.

Other researchers had occasionally described flake­rich palaeolithic industries which could not be classedas Mousterian and which apparently dated to anearlier time when hand-axes were common (Commont(1909, 1912) described an anomalously early 'warm'Mousterian; see also Kendall, 1915, 1916; Bury, 1916).However, Hazzledine Warren proposed, more explic­itly, that this was more than a brief overlap betweenlate Acheulian and early Mousterian (or 'Levalloisian')industries and instead reflected a lengthy contempor­aneity between the makers of two different kinds ofpalaeolithic industry. Warren published his thoughts inthe early 1920s. He observed that his Mesvinian had'no cultural connection with the Chellian andAcheulian stages' and suggested that such industriesmight be the reflection of different contemporaneousraces and cultures (Warren, 1922, p. 602). He advo­cated two separate industrial lines which he associatedwith two different racial streams: one stream producingthree chronologically-successive flake-dominated indus­tries (the Mesvinian, Levalloisian and Mousterian);the other making the Chellean and Acheulian hand-axeindustries (Warren, 1923).

Another early proponent of parallel flake and hand­axe industries who must be acknowledged was HugoObermaier (1877~1946), the German prehistorian andgeologist (Oberrnaier, 1906, 1908; Narr in Collins,1969). In 1919, Obermaier outlined different geo­graphical provinces for two groups of tool-makers,observing that the hand-axe-makers had lived inWestern Europe and the Mediterranean whilst contem­porary 'Premousterian' groups (who did not makehand-axes) occupied central and Eastern Europe(Obermaier, 1919). But despite the suggestions ofWarren and Obermaier, and notwithstanding thegrowing numbers of anomalous industries which weredifficult to accommodate within the old industrialpattern, most researchers continued to describe theirdiscoveries in terms of the linear Chellean-Acheulian­Mousterian framework. It was not until the late 1920sand early 1930s, when the Abbe Henri Breuil (Fig. 3)rose to power in Britain, that the concept of parallelindustries in the early palaeolithic became popular.

5. BREUIL AND A NEW PALAEOLITHICSEQUENCE FOR THE 1930S

In the 1930s, Breuil's chronological framework for theQuaternary dominated British interpretations of thepalaeolithic record and influenced their perceptions ofQuaternary geology (Childe, 1935,1951; Kelley, 1937;Garrod, 1938). Breuil's scheme described two parallellines of evolving industries, with more branches devel­oping in later palaeolithic times. He set up a strongdistinction between the industries with hand-axes andflakes, and the pure flake cultures with no hand-axes(Breuil, 1929, 1932a; Breuil & Koslowski, 1931,

Fig. 3. The Abbe Henri Breuil (1877-1961), undated photo­graph (ULC: Add. 7959, Box I). Reproduced by pennissionof the Syndics of Cambridge University Library.

1932,1934). Breuil also added further sub-stages (orphases) to the old industrial classification: theAcheulian, for example, now had seven differentphases running from Acheulian I to Acheulian VII.

Most importantly, Breuil managed to anchor thesefine industrial phases within the famous and popularchronological framework of glacial and interglacialepisodes developed by Albrecht Penck and EduardBruckner (1901-1909). Breuil's palaeolithic schemewas based on the Somme Valley sequence which lay farfrom the glacial districts; but when he was shownaround East Anglia and the Thames Valley by Britishgeologists in the early 1920s, Breuil realised that thesolifluxion deposits in the Somme presented evidenceof cold climate. This supplied a crucial link to theglaciations of the Penck-Briickner scheme and wouldallow broader glacial-industrial connections to bedrawn between the Somme Valley sequence and otherdeposits and industries across Europe (Breuil, 1937a,1948). Breuil also invoked the glaciations as an expla­nation for industrial change in Britain and NorthFrance: he thought that widespread movements ofdifferent groups of toolmakers across Europe had beenprovoked by these climatic shifts, and described howthe flake industries appeared at the approach of

46 A. O'CONNOR

Fig. 4. Paul Wernert, Hugo Obermaier and Henri Breuilc. 1913 (ULC: Add.7959, Box I). Reproduced by permissionof the Syndics of Cambridge University Library.

glaciations and lasted into the beginning of the inter­glacials, whereas the hand-axe industries were trulyinterglacial (Breuil, 1932a).

Although Breuil believed that he was the first tooutline the distinction between hand-axe and non­hand-axe industries, Warren and Obermaier had alsomade suggestions along similar lines and it is likelythat Breuil had discussed the subject with them (Breuil,1908, 1936; Narr in Ohel, 1979). Obermaier, whomBreuil had met in 1904, worked alongside Breuil asa fellow Professor at the Institut de PaleontologieHumaine in the 1910s (Fig. 4), and Breuil had visitedWarren in the early 1920s (Breuil, 1950). By theearly 1930s, Breuil's compatriot, Denis Peyrony

(1869-1954), was also publishing his views on differentcontemporary industries in France (Peyrony, 1930,1931).

John McNabb has noted the popularity of Breuil'sscheme and its weighty influence on interpretations ofthe Britain Palaeolithic (McNabb, 1996). Indeed,Breuil's scheme achieved far greater popularity inBritain than it ever enjoyed in France (Sackett, 1991).There are a number of reasons for this. His interpreta­tions were heavily based on the same Somme Valleysites which had inspired Smith and Dewey's classicconclusions in the 1910s (see Table 3), so they blendedwell with British expectations. Breuil had worked withCommont in the Somme Valley before Commont'sdeath after the evacuation of Abbeville late in the FirstWorld War (Boule, 1918-1919; Breuil, 1937b). By theearly 1920s Breuil had adopted the Somme Valley ashis own favourite research area (Breuil, 1939; Garrod,1961). Another point worth considering is that Breuil'sscheme arrived at a time of uncertainty amongst Britishgeologists regarding the definition and chronologicalsuccession of the glacial deposits known as boulderclays and the fluviatile sediments of the river valleys.

The industries of the old linear industrial frameworkhad proved useful to a number of geologists whowere attempting to date and correlate the Quaternarydeposits of southern England (Boswell, 1930). How­ever, the rise in claims for contemporary core­industries and flake-industries had cast doubt on thereliability of this palaeolithic chronology (Peak!;:, 1930;Boswell, 1931; Dewey, 1931). By the early 1930s, it hadbecome apparent that two different archaeologicalzone-fossils could now be of the same age and it nowappeared that 'the simple succession, Early Chelles,Chelles, Evolved CheHes, St. Acheul and Le Moustierno longer holds good' (Peake, 1930, p. 383). Breuil'sscheme had fostered some of these doubts; but it alsopresented a solution. His combination of minute indus­trial sub-stages and a well-known (Penck-Briickner)glacial chronology offered geologists a fine-grained

Table 3, The industrial succession of Commont and the industrial-glacial scheme of Breuil & Koslowski (1931, 1932).

Commont

Mousterian

Acheulian and 'warm' MousterianAcheulianAcheulian,'Chelleen evolue'

'Chelleen typique'

Pre-Chellean

Breuil & Koslowski (1931-1932)

Industries

Aurignacian, So!utrean, MagdalenianLevalloisian V, Upper Levalloisian.True Mousterian of the caves is not present in the Somme, butinfluenced the Middle and Upper LevalloisianLevalloisian III-IV, Final Acheulian VI, and VII (Micoquian)Levalloisian I-II, Upper Acheulian VMiddle Acheulian IV

Middle Acheulian IIIEarly Acheulian I-IIEvolved Clactonian [II]Chellean (and Early Clactonian [I] of England)

Glacial phases

Wiirm, 2nd phaseWiirm, 1st phase

Riss-WiirmRissMindel-Riss, 3rd phase

Mindel-Riss, 2nd phaseMindel-Riss, 1st phase

Giinz-Mindel

HAZZLEDINE WARREN AND THE BRITISH QUATERNARY CHRONOLOGY 47

Afler King & Oakley (1936) and Oakley & Leakey (1937),

Table 4. Oakley's Clactonian phases.relative dating system that might assist their interpre­tations of the British Quaternary deposits.

Breuil himself expressed a certain degree of cautionabout his scheme, confiding to Oakley: 'I don't thinkthe division in 7 stages of the Achelean [sic] is quitesatisfactory; it was a trial essay' and adding 'ourknowledge of many details oflevels and types is alwaysin flux' (Breuil to Oakley, II December 1936: NHMArchives, DFI40/6). However, his industrial frame­work was to become an integral part of Quaternaryresearch over the 1930s and early I940s (Dewey, 1932;Bury, 1935; Smith, 1935; King & Oakley. 1936;Lacaille, 1936, 1940).

Industrial phase

Clactonian 1II

Clactonian lIB

Clactonian IIAClactonian I (associatedwith Abbevillian and(Early) Acheulian I-II)

Locality

High Lodge. Stoke Newington.Swanscombe Middle GravelClacton Channel,C1acton-on-Sea, Little ThurrockSwanscombe Lower GravelFound in derived condition inthe Swanscombe Lower Gravel

6. THE CLACTONIAN AND THE GEOLOGY OFTHE LOWER THAMES VALLEY

The treatment of the Clactonian during the 1930s illus­trates Breuil's weighty influence on British interpreta­tions of geology and prehistory. By this time, Warrenand Breuil had decided, independently, to changethe name of the Clacton-on-Sea industry from theMesvinian to the 'Clactonian' (Warren, 1926; Breuil,1932b). More importantly, this industry had beenlinked to Smith and Dewey's assemblage from theLower Gravel of Barnfield Pit in the Thames Valley(Breuil, 1929; Chandler, 1931). Following the practicepopularized by Breuil, the Clactonian was soon dividedinto a series of sub-stages - Clactonian I, IIA, lIB andIII - each phase exhibiting a progressive improvementin workmanship over its predecessor (Chandler, 1930,1931; Breuil, 1932b; Oakley in Oakley & Leakey 1937).

Warren was uneasy about such subdivisions, for heremembered the confusion caused in the past byshifts in the meaning of de Mortillet's 'Chellean' and'Acheulian' (Warren, I924b, 1926, 1932a; Warren inHawkes et aI., 1938). The great changes in industrialterminology which had taken place between the timeof Commont and the heyday of Breuil are evidentfrom Table 3. (By the 1930s, Smith and Dewey's'Chellean' of the Middle Gravels was known as the'Acheulian'.) In a draft report of the conclusionsreached by the committee working on Swanscombein the late 1930s, Warren, who was one of thecommittee members, warned that the Clactonian sub­stages not only confused the palaeolithic nomencla­ture but also contained an implication of relative date(Warren, c. 1938: BM(F): Swanscombe I Kent).However, this implication of relative date provedvery attractive to geologists and prehistorians seekingto construct a reliable Quaternary framework. Forexample, Kenneth Oakley's belief in the archaeologi­cal progression of the Clactonian through phases I,IIA, lIB and III (see Table 4) would heavily bias hisgeological interpretation of the relationship betweenthe deposits of the Thames Valley and those fromClacton-on-Sea.

Kenneth Oakley (1911-1981), Assistant Keeper in theDepartment of Geology at the British Museum,

employed the C1actonian phases as fine-grained chrono­logical indicators to help him arrange the sequence ofdeposits left by an ancient river in the present-dayThames Valley. In 1936 Oakley and William King,Professor of Geology at University College. London,published their renowned and influential article on 'ThePleistocene Succession in the Lower part of the ThamesValley' (King & Oakley, 1936). Warren's recent dis­covery - that the ancient river-channel at Clacton rep­resented 'the actual channel of the Thames' rather thana mere tributary - was crucial for Oakley's interpreta­tions, for it provided him with the means to correlatethe geological and archaeological succession of theThames Valley with that of the Clacton Channel(Warren, 1922, 1932a, p. 16; Oakley & Leakey, 1937).

By this time, the old standard divisions of theThames terraces into a 100 ft or Boyn Hill terrace, ayounger 50 ft or Taplow terrace, and other more recentstages which are less relevant to this discussion, hadlong been regarded as overly simplistic. Several inter­mediate terraces had already been proposed betweenthe 50 ft and the 100 ft terraces (8; Warren, 1926;Burchell, 1934). The distinction between these twoterraces had been confused further by the adamantclaims of palaeontologists such as Martin Hintonand A. S. Kennard that there was little differencebetween the 100 ft terrace fauna and the early 50 ftterrace fauna, and that the major faunal break fellwithin the 50 ft terrace (Kennard, 1916; Hinton, 1926).The industrial phases offered 'a way out of this con­fusion. King and Oakley abandoned the old terracedivisions and organized the Quaternary deposits ofthe Lower Thames Valley into a number of stages.Some of these stages were based on Oakley's interpret­ation of the C1actonian phases. Indeed, Oakley evenproposed an Inter-Boyn Hill erosion stage, on very slimgeological grounds, in order to keep the Clactonianindustries in the expected order (King & Oakley, 1936;Oakley in Oakley & Leakey, 1937; Alvan T. Marston(1937) suggested a similar solution for some ratherdifferent palaeolithic discrepancies at Barnfield Pit).

Oakley was driven to these lengths by his belief thatMiddle Gravel of Barnfield pit was deposited after theClactonian liB of the Clacton Channel, a conclusionwhich was based on archaeological considerations (see

48 A. O'CONNOR

Table 5. The Lower Thames Valley stages of King & Oakley (1936), associated industries Md links to the Swanscombe(Barnfield Pit) sequence.

Swanscombe stratigraphicalsequence

Middle Gravel

Weathering ofLower LoamLower LoamLower Gravel

Industries from Barnfield Pit and Clacton-on-Sea

Maximum aggradation. Middle Acheulian (III-IV),Clactonian III

Aggradation. Clactonian lIB deposited in theClacton and Little Thurrock ChannelsErosion. Channels excavated at Clacton andLittle Thurrock

Clactonian IIADerived Clactonian IDerived Abbevillian

Lower Thames Valley stages of King &Oakley (1936)

Middle Barnfield stage (late Boyn Hill)

IIford stageClacton-on-Sea stage

Inter-Boyn Hill erosion stage

Lower Barnfield (early Boyn Hill) stage

Tables 3 and 5; Oakley & Leakey, 1937; Oakley, 1939;see McNabb, 1996). Both Oakley and Warren werehappy that the Clactonian (IIA) from the LowerGravel was earlier than the Clacton Channel industry(Warren, 1932a, b; Oakley in Oakley & Leakey, 1937).However, the Middle Gravel contained MiddleAcheulian (III-IV) tools and the newly definedClactonian III industry, both of which were expectedto post-date Clactonian lIB, according to the princi­ples outlined by Breuil (King & Oakley, 1936; Oakleyin Oakley & Leakey, 1937). The major geologicaldifficulty facing such an interpretation was thatthe Clacton Channel (and Little Thurrock, whereClactonian lIB had also been found) lay at a lowerlevel than the Middle Gravel, and this suggested thatthese channels had been cut down later in the geologi­cal cycle as the Thames eroded its bed. As Oakley putit, 'the low level of the Clacton channel depositsrequires some special explanation, if, as the evidenceindubitably suggests, they post-date the Lower Gravel,but pre-date the Middle Gravels of the 100-ft terrace'(Oakley in Oakley & Leakey, 1937, p. 253).

King and Oakley resolved their difficulty by assign­ing the Lower and the Middle Gravels to differentstages in their Thames Valley chronology. Theyinvoked an episode of down-cutting between the two ­the Inter-Boyn Hill erosion stage - and described asubsequent aggradation back to the 100 ft level whichleft the Middle Gravel deposits. This would explain thelower level, but intermediate date, of the ClactonChannel and its Clactonian lIB industry (see Table 5).Warren had initially concluded from the faunal evi­dence that the Middle Gravel of Barnfield pit hadbeen deposited before his Clacton Channel industry(Warren, 1932b). However, by 1942 he had comeround to Oakley's unorthodox view that the ClactonChannel was formed at a period of hiatus betweenthe deposition of the Lower and Middle Gravels ofSwanscombe, and was correlated with the LittleThurrock Channel. He justified this shift of opinion onthe grounds that archaeological evidence offered a

higher chronological resolution than palaeontologicaldata (Warren, 1942). Although some attacked thiserosion stage as special pleading (Chandler in Bull,1942; Wooldridge in Hare, 1947), King and Oakley'sscheme became a standard geological classification.

7. THE DECLINE OF THE PALAEOLITHICCHRONOLOGY

Warren's Clactonian had come a long way since itsoriginal reception as an enigmatic or anomalouS'indus­try. The principles popularized by Breuil had notonly enabled the Clactonian to be employed as a usefulchronological indicator within Britain; the term'Clactonian' had also been used to describe the wholeindustrial family of flake-cultures, giving this industrya global prominence (Paterson, 1940-1941; 1942,pp. 184-185). However, by the 1950s, correlations andclassifications based on Breuil's scheme had beenstretched too far. In a backlash against over­generalization, the foundations of his framework wereperceived more clearly: this sequence had, after all,been based on discoveries in the Somme Valley, a verysmall region of Western Europe. Questions were askedabout its relevance beyond this restricted area; this hadimportant implications for the reliability of the geo­logical and archaeological edifices which had beenconstructed in the 1930s.

The reactions against past generalizations werederived from two sources. Some had been stimulatedby the discovery and classification of new industriesfrom Asia and Africa which did not fit the idea ofparallel hand-axe and flake cultures (Lowe & Breuil,1945; Caton-Thompson, 1946; Movius, 1948). Otherswere provoked by research undertaken on a detailedlocal scale. At the site of Baker's Hole in the ThamesValley, for example, it was evident by the early 1940sthat the Thames Valley Levallois V appeared to becontemporaneous with the Somme Valley Levallois II.Oakley observed: 'Such possibilities make many

HAZZLEDINE WARREN AND THE BRITISH QUATERNARY CHRONOLOGY 49

geologists distrust the use of archaeological evidence'(Oakley, 1943, p. 31). He now admitted 'that he wasless confident than he was in 1936 about the value ofpalaeoliths for close dating, in view of the culturalcomplexities within the Lower Palaeolithic, whichrecent studies had revealed' (Oakley in Hare, 1947,p. 337).

The Clactonian sub-stages were also falling intodisrepute. In 195 I, Oakley observed in a letter to LouisLeakey that there seemed to be no good evidence forthe existence of Clactonian I or Clactonian III, andthat 'the typological advancement of any particular"Clacton II" industry appears to vary horizontally(from place to place) as much as it does vertically'(Oakley to L. Leakey, 25 January 1951: NHMArchives, DFI4017). This drove Oakley to re-evaluatehis interpretation of the Thames Valley deposits; a fewweeks later he confided to Warren:

I am inclined to leave the problem of the relationof the channel to the Swanscombe terrace as anopen one. I have not abandoned my originaltheory to the extent of suggesting that it can't beright; but I want to emphasize that it is by nomeans proved, and that it is even possible that theC. [Clacton] channel is later than the MiddleGravels (Oakley to Warren, 12 February 1951:NHM Archives, DFI4017).

Warren had made an important, but largely unap­preciated, contribution to the more celebrated synthe­ses of those like Breuil or King and Oakley, even if hehad not always agreed with their conclusions. In thebacklash against Breuil's scheme, however, it was notonly these syntheses which would suffer; the kind ofdetailed, local, multi-disciplinary researches carriedout by Warren and by like-minded colleagues wouldalso be pushed even more firmly into the background.The questions asked of the palaeolithic past and thepractice of palaeolithic research would both changegreatly when geologists became more wary of thechronological value once accorded to palaeolithicindustries, and when archaeologists cast the task ofdating into the hands of the geologists. FredericZeuner summed up these debates over the BritishQuaternary chronology with the comment: 'I still feelthat Pleistocene chronology is the clock by whicharchaeological, or rather Palaeolithic, time is to bemeasured, and it makes nonsense of time-counting touse as clocks the very objects it is desired to time'(Zeuner, 1959, p. xiii). By this time, many archaeolo­gists agreed with him.

The rise of doubts over palaeolithic classificationand chronology - subjects once of mutual interest toBritish geologists and palaeolithic researchers - coin­cided with a volley of strident suggestions, made byself-confessed (and, by now, often professional)'archaeologists', that a more global, ecological andanthropological approach to palaeolithic archaeologywas needed, and that artefacts ought to be appreciatedas the reflection of past social activities rather than asthe means to construct techno-typological patterns(ChiIde, 1944; Garrod, 1946; Goodwin, 1946; Movius,1948; McBurney, 1950). They would inherit the field ofpalaeolithic research. Geologists, encouraged by therefinement of pollen sequences and the rise of absolutedating techniques in the late 1950s, would continueto make their essential contributions to palaeolithicarchaeology. But the geological-and-palaeolithic­researchers like Hazzledine Warren now looked anti­quated; their days of quiet glory had passed.

Manuscript sources

BM(F) British Museum (Franks House), LondonNHM British Museum (Natural History), London,

Anthropology sub-department correspon­dence, K. P. Oakley papers (DF 140/6, 14017)

BGS British Geological Survey Archives, BGSLibrary, Keyworth

UCL University College London (Institute ofArchaeology), Manuscripts Room, FredericZeuner diaries

ULC University Library, Cambridge, ManuscriptsRoom, Miles Burkitt papers (Add 7959)

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The author would like to thank John McNabb(University of Southampton) for his encouraging anduseful comments on the original draft of this article;and Peter Rowley-Conwy, Mark White (University ofDurham) and Derek Roe (University of Oxford) forsharing their appreciation of Hazzledine Warren in thepast. Photographs from Cambridge University Libraryare reproduced by permission of the Syndics ofCambridge University Library. All material from LISArchives, The Natural History Museum, is used hereby permission of the Trustees of The Natural HistoryMuseum. Thanks must also go to the libraries of theGeological Survey and the Institute of Archaeology,University College London for granting permission toquote references and reproduce images from theirarchives.

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52 A. O'CONNOR

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Manuscript received 27 July 2004; revised typescript accepted 15 June 2005