On the distal end of a mammalian humerus from Tonbridge (Hemiomus major) / by H.G. Seeley.
- Harry Govier Seeley
- Date:
- 1899
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: On the distal end of a mammalian humerus from Tonbridge (Hemiomus major) / by H.G. Seeley. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.
3/6
![[From the Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society/or August 1899, Vol. Iv. | On the Distal End of a Mammalian Hdmerus from Tonbridge [HEiiioiiVS major). By Prof. H. G. Seeley, F.R.S., F.L.S., F.G.S. Mr. R. D’A. Anderson, of the Royal Indian Engineering College, has submitted to me the distal end of the right humerus of a mammal for determination. The bone was found in August 1898 by Mr. GrenvLllo Anderson, on the bank of the River Medway near Tonbridge (at a time when the river was running very low), when it was seen projecting from the reconstructed rock. The locality is not far from Messrs. Curtis & Harvey’s gunpowder-mills, at a point between a broken and disused lock-basin and an old bridge near the ballast-pit. On visiting the spot I found fragments of flints among the materials which form the river-banks; but although this might support a reference of the specimen to any geological period of subsequent date, there are conditions of mineral structure and osteological character which incline me to believe that the bone has been derived from the Weald Clay. When the fossil came under my notice, the distal end was broken from the shaft; and the shaft was split, showing the very thin condition of the bone of the shaft, and the hard, sandy, caleareou. matter which filled the medullary cavity. Traces of matrix at the distal end show that the specimen has been derived from (]uartz- sand bound together with limonite, such as might occur in the Hastings Sand, Weald Clay, or Lower Greensand, but the character of this matrix is opposed to the possibility of the specimen being of post-Tertiary age. The fossil, as preserved, is 4 inches long, and indicates a humerus which may have been 6 inches long when perfect, as large as that of a wolf, but smaller than in a bloodhound. The shaft of the bone is flattened on the inner side, convex on the outer side, and thus it has a side-to-side compression approximating to half a cylinder, but is somewhat flaltened towards the olecranon- pit behind. It is rather obliquely flattened above the condyles in front, making the shaft | inch deep on the inner side at the distal end, and rather less on the outer side. The side-to-side measurement is least, as usual, above the distal articulation. Towards the proximal fracture the depth of the shaft, which is augmenting, is inch from front to back, while the side-to-side measurement is inch. The form of the shaft, flattened on the inner side, precludes any comparison of the animal with Carnivora, and indicates a resem- blance to Ungulate types. The distal articular condyles are set on to the shaft at a forward angle, which shows the animal to be terrestrial. When the shaft is held vertically, the condyles are anterior to it. There is no animal known to me in which this character is developed to the s uuc extent. The extreme width of the condylar end of the bono is 1 j inch. In narrowness of the condyles the character is somewhat ])ig-likc. The external surface of the condylar end of the bono is convex and](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b22412840_0005.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
