Publications
Ambrosiana: Letters and Belongings of Certain Ladies of Ambrose Place, Worthing; Family history names Dawson, Venner, Crawford, Sidebottom , by Theodore Grant Brown, published 1936 (191 pp., Liverpool: Lee & Nightingale) accessible at: British Library & West Sussex Libraries
The Piltdown Forgery, by J. S. Weiner, published 1957 (Geoffrey Cumberlege, Oxford University Press)
Review by E. Cecil Curwen in Sussex Notes and Queries, November 1955:It is a remarkable thing that the Sussex Archaeological Society took no official notice whatever of the Piltdon discoveries when they were first made, although they were the subject of eager discussion throughout the scientific world in two Continents, and brought international fame to, at any rate, one aspect of Sussex archaeology. Dr. Weiner, who is Reader in Physical Anthropology at Oxford, and is one of the scientists who was responsible for the discovery of the now well-known fraud, hints that the Society's apathy in this matter may have been due to doubt of the genuineness of the discoveries from the beginning. In this case the 'prophet', Charles Dawson, seems to have enjoyed unlimited honour everywhere, except in his own county and in the Sussex Archaeological Society, of which he was a member - not because Sussex people failed to recognise his merits, but rather, perhaps, because they had better opportunities of realising his weaknesses.
The story of the Piltdown problem and its background, as represented by scientific opinions held at the beginning of the present century regarding the origin and evolution of Man, are fascinatingly outlined by the author, leading on to a consideration of the increasing difficulty felt by palaeontologists in fitting the Piltdown discoveries into the present-day framework of anthropological knowledge. It was the realisation that the remains found at Piltdown could no longer be regarded as a 'missing link', so much as a baffling monster, which led the author to think of the possibility of their being fraudulent, as the only means of resolving the impasse.
The scientific tests to which all the remains were subjected are described in a way that will hold the interest of the ordinary educated reader, and the full significance of each is made clear. A whole battery of chemical and physical tests were brought to bear on the remains by Dr. K. P. Oakley "an array of new techniques . . . exceeding all endeavours of this kind in the whole history of palaeontology," even including tests for radio-activity and crystal structure. The results were completely conclusive, proving that not one of the items was genuinely found at Piltdown or at the neighbouring site at Sheffield Park, but that a carefully selected assortment of fossil remains from a variety of sources, including also a piece of the jaw of a modern orang outang (suitably treated and stained), had been deliberately 'planted' there in order that they should be found by the excavators.
Who, then, could have been responsible for this very discreditable piece of work, and what could have been his motive? The author goes on to review the evidence for this, discussing all the personalities involved, and referring to many past and present members of the Society. All lines of circumstantial evidence seem to point to Charles Dawson as the guilty party, but the author charitably goes on to say, "In the circumstances, can we withhold from Dawson the one alternative possibility, remote though it seems, but which we cannot altogether disprove; that he might, after all, have been implicated in a 'joke', perhaps not his own, which went too far? Would it not be fairer to one who cannot speak for himself to let it go at that?"
The false scent laid at Piltdown has greatly hindered the progress of the study of human palaeontology, and now that it has been eliminated everyone concerned will breath more freely. For the general reader Dr. Weiner's book explains all this in a most readable way, while the account of the detective work on the forgery itself is quite absorbing. Every member of the Society should possess and read this book.
The story of the Piltdown problem and its background, as represented by scientific opinions held at the beginning of the present century regarding the origin and evolution of Man, are fascinatingly outlined by the author, leading on to a consideration of the increasing difficulty felt by palaeontologists in fitting the Piltdown discoveries into the present-day framework of anthropological knowledge. It was the realisation that the remains found at Piltdown could no longer be regarded as a 'missing link', so much as a baffling monster, which led the author to think of the possibility of their being fraudulent, as the only means of resolving the impasse.
The scientific tests to which all the remains were subjected are described in a way that will hold the interest of the ordinary educated reader, and the full significance of each is made clear. A whole battery of chemical and physical tests were brought to bear on the remains by Dr. K. P. Oakley "an array of new techniques . . . exceeding all endeavours of this kind in the whole history of palaeontology," even including tests for radio-activity and crystal structure. The results were completely conclusive, proving that not one of the items was genuinely found at Piltdown or at the neighbouring site at Sheffield Park, but that a carefully selected assortment of fossil remains from a variety of sources, including also a piece of the jaw of a modern orang outang (suitably treated and stained), had been deliberately 'planted' there in order that they should be found by the excavators.
Who, then, could have been responsible for this very discreditable piece of work, and what could have been his motive? The author goes on to review the evidence for this, discussing all the personalities involved, and referring to many past and present members of the Society. All lines of circumstantial evidence seem to point to Charles Dawson as the guilty party, but the author charitably goes on to say, "In the circumstances, can we withhold from Dawson the one alternative possibility, remote though it seems, but which we cannot altogether disprove; that he might, after all, have been implicated in a 'joke', perhaps not his own, which went too far? Would it not be fairer to one who cannot speak for himself to let it go at that?"
The false scent laid at Piltdown has greatly hindered the progress of the study of human palaeontology, and now that it has been eliminated everyone concerned will breath more freely. For the general reader Dr. Weiner's book explains all this in a most readable way, while the account of the detective work on the forgery itself is quite absorbing. Every member of the Society should possess and read this book.
Charles Dawson and the Lavant Cave, by Timothy J. McCann, published April 1981 in Sussex Archæological Society Newsletter (no. 33, article, p.234, ISSN: 0307-2568) accessible at: S.A.S. library Download PDF
Science fraud at Piltdown: the amateur and the priest, by Harold R. Booher, published 1986 in Antioch Review (vol. 44, no. 3, article, pp.389-407)
Namely Charles Dawson and Teilhard de Chardin.
The Piltdown Man and the Norman Conquest: Working Volumes and Printer's Copy for Charles Dawson's" The History of Hastings Castle", by Peter Miles, published 1993 in Studies in Bibliography (vol. 46, article, pp.357-370)
Unraveling Piltdown: The Science Fraud of the Century and its Solution, by John Evangelist Walsh, published 1997 (xx + 279 pp., New York: Random House, ISBN-10: 0679444440 & ISBN-13: 9780679444442) accessible at: British Library & West Sussex Libraries & East Sussex Libraries
Abstract:In 1913 an amateur fossil hunter and antiquarian named Charles Dawson found in a gravel pit in England parts of the skull of an entirely new species of pre-human. The discovery, soon known as Piltdown Man, caused headlines worldwide trumpeting the claim that the evolutionary "missing link" between ape and man had been found. Controversy quickly arose, with many scientists charging that the jaw and cranium were not related and must have come from two different creatures, an ancient man and an ancient ape. But the believers prevailed and for forty years Piltdown Man held his place - though a troubled place - in the fast-developing evolutionary scheme. In 1953, using advanced techniques for dating fossils, a team of English scientist's dramatically exposed Piltdown Man as nothing more than an amazing fraud, an ingenious but undoubted forgery. In Unraveling Piltdown, John Evangelist Walsh tells the complete story of the astonishing hoax, and convincingly exposes the true culprit. A final chapter explains in detail exactly how the entire affair was managed, offering a precise description of the planting and discovery of each of the fraudulent specimens. Filled with vivid portraits of Edwardian personalities, based strictly on documentary evidence, Unraveling Piltdown is a thoroughly absorbing detective story in which one of history's greatest frauds is finally solved.
Piltdown Man: The Secret Life of Charles Dawson, by Miles Russell, published 1 December 2003 (272 pp., The History Press, ISBN-10: 0752425722 & ISBN-13: 9780752425726) accessible at: West Sussex Libraries & East Sussex Libraries
Abstract:The human and animal remains discovered at Piltdown, near Lewes in Sussex almost 100 years ago were at the time hailed as the 'missing link' between ape and man. It was not until 1953 that modern analysis conclusively revealed an ingenious hoax. The perpetrator was almost certainly the antiquarian excavator Charles Dawson who, as Miles Russell shows, was responsible for sixteen other archaeological forgeries during his lifetime.
The Piltdown Forgery, by J. S. Weiner, published 29 January 2004 (248 pp., Oxford University Press, 50th anniversary edition, ISBN-10: 0198607806 & ISBN-13: 9780198607809) accessible at: West Sussex Libraries & East Sussex Libraries
Charles Dawson's rare essay on the hermitage at Buxted, by Peter Miles, published 2007 in Sussex Archæological Collections (vol. 145, article, pp.195-209) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 15980] & The Keep [LIB/500363] & S.A.S. library View Online
Abstract:The Sussex antiquarian Charles Dawson, notorious for his involvement in the Piltdown Man fraud, wrote an essay on the rock hermitage at Buxted which has yet to figure in direct discussion of Dawson's life, work and forgeries. The essay was printed in limited numbers early in the twentieth century as the introduction to photograph albums commissioned by Cecil De M. Caulfeild Pratt of High Hurstwood, Buxted. Particularly in context with the photographs, Dawson's essay throws further light on his interests, motivations, scholarly methods and on previously unrecorded social and professional contacts. Internal evidence from Dawson's essay, together with the present author's family history, is used to suggest a window of dating for the essay and for the photographs (by Towner of Uckfield). It is further suggested how one of Dawson's footnotes to the essay relates to the forging of inscribed Roman tiles allegedly found at Pevensey Castle. Dawson's essay is then reproduced as an appendix, with some annotations.
Prelude To Piltdown. Charles Dawson's origins, career and antiquarian pursuits, 1864-1911, and their repercussions, by John H. Farrant, published 2013 in Sussex Archæological Collections (vol. 151, article) accessible at: W.S.R.O. [Lib 18616] & The Keep [LIB/507730] & S.A.S. library View Online
Abstract:Towards the end of his life Charles Dawson (1864-1916), amateur palaeontologist and antiquary, discovered the remains of Piltdown Man and since 1953 has been heavily implicated in their fabrication. On him in that connection much has been written, but little has been published on his earlier life with adequate documentation. Drawing on sources not previously used, this article describes his family background, upbringing and fossil collecting, and his career as a solicitor, and explores his antiquarian pursuits in Sussex, particularly his association with Hastings Museum and with the Sussex Archaeological Society (including the society's ejection from Castle Lodge), his excavations at Hastings Castle and the Lavant caves, the Beauport Park statuette, the Pevensey Roman bricks, his History of Hastings Castle and his attempt to thwart L. F. Salzman's election to the Society of Antiquaries. The antiquarian phase of Dawson's research career was neatly bracketed by A. S. Woodward's publication in 1891 and 1911 of his successive finds of Plagiaulax dawsoni.
These antiquarian pursuits show his enormous energy and charm, occasional disingenuous conduct, and the facility with which he moved between West End society and Sussex labourers, an important source of his finds. As a well-known collector he may have accepted, and attempted to exploit, items of doubtful authenticity, but his recording of provenance was reasonable by contemporary amateur standards. He actively used the press, local and London, to boost his reputation. But his failure to conceal the limits of his scholarship in his History of Hastings Castle of 1910 contributed to his reverting to palaeontology.
A face-saving account of the 'Castle Lodge episode' of 1903, doubts emerging in 1914 about the finds from the Lavant caves, and Salzman's antipathy for Dawson on account of the Pevensey bricks (1907) and his canvassing the Antiquaries (1911), may all have contributed to Piltdown Man being disregarded by the Sussex Archaeological Society. But they cannot of themselves have outweighed the advocacy by Woodward, Dawson's collaborator at Piltdown, who was active in the society between 1924 and 1943. The implication is that there were doubts expressed locally, but only informally, about the authenticity of Piltdown Man.
These antiquarian pursuits show his enormous energy and charm, occasional disingenuous conduct, and the facility with which he moved between West End society and Sussex labourers, an important source of his finds. As a well-known collector he may have accepted, and attempted to exploit, items of doubtful authenticity, but his recording of provenance was reasonable by contemporary amateur standards. He actively used the press, local and London, to boost his reputation. But his failure to conceal the limits of his scholarship in his History of Hastings Castle of 1910 contributed to his reverting to palaeontology.
A face-saving account of the 'Castle Lodge episode' of 1903, doubts emerging in 1914 about the finds from the Lavant caves, and Salzman's antipathy for Dawson on account of the Pevensey bricks (1907) and his canvassing the Antiquaries (1911), may all have contributed to Piltdown Man being disregarded by the Sussex Archaeological Society. But they cannot of themselves have outweighed the advocacy by Woodward, Dawson's collaborator at Piltdown, who was active in the society between 1924 and 1943. The implication is that there were doubts expressed locally, but only informally, about the authenticity of Piltdown Man.
Charles Dawson's anti-Zeppelin bullet, by J. H. Farrant, published 2017 in Sussex Archæological Collections (vol. 155, short article, pp.207-209)