The evidence for this earlier origin of man was ably summed up, not only by its brilliant advocate, Mortillet, but by a former opponent, one of the most conservative of modern anthropologists, Quatrefages; and the conclusion arrived at by both was, that man did really exist in the Tertiary period.

The acceptance of this conclusion was also seen in the more recent work of Alfred Russel Wallace, who, though very cautious and conservative, placed the origin of man not only in the Tertiary period, but in an earlier stage of it than most had dared assign--even in the Miocene.
The first thing raising a strong presumption, if not giving proof, that man existed in the Tertiary, was the fact that from all explored parts of the world came in more and more evidence that in the earlier Quaternary man existed in different, strongly marked races and in great numbers.

From all regions which geologists had explored, even from those the most distant and different from each other, came this same evidence--from northern Europe to southern Africa; from France to China; from New Jersey to British Columbia; from British Columbia to Peru.

The development of man in such numbers and in so many different regions, with such differences of race and at so early a period, must have required a long previous time.
This argument was strengthened by discoveries of bones bearing marks apparently made by cutting instruments, in the Tertiary formations of France and Italy, and by the discoveries of what were claimed to be flint implements by the Abbe Bourgeois in France, and of implements and human bones by Prof.Capellini in Italy.
On the other hand, some of the more cautious men of science are still content to say that the existence of man in the Tertiary period is not yet proven.

As to his existence throughout the Quaternary epoch, no new proofs are needed; even so determined a supporter of the theological side as the Duke of Argyll has been forced to yield to the evidence.
Of attempts to make an exact chronological statement throwing light on the length of the various prehistoric periods, the most notable have been those by M.Morlot, on the accumulated strata of the Lake of Geneva; by Gillieron, on the silt of Lake Neufchatel; by Horner, in the delta deposits of Egypt; and by Riddle, in the delta of the Mississippi.
But while these have failed to give anything like an exact result, all these investigations together point to the central truth, so amply established, of the vast antiquity of man, and the utter inadequacy of the chronology given in our sacred books.