_Conclusion._--To-day anthropology is grappling with the heavy task of systematizing the vast stores of knowledge to which the key was found by Boucher de Perthes, by Lartet, Christy and their successors. There have been recently no discoveries to rival in novelty those which followed the exploration of the bone-caves and drift-gravels, and which effected an instant revolution in all accepted theories of man's antiquity, substituting for a chronology of centuries a vague computation of hundreds of thousands of years. The existence of man in remote geological time cannot now be questioned, but, despite much effort made in likely localities, no bones, with the exception of those of the much-discussed _Pithecanthropus_, have been found which can be regarded as definitely bridging the gulf between man and the lower creation. It seems as if anthropology had in this direction reached the limits of its discoveries. Far different are the prospects in other directions where the work of co-ordinating the material and facts collected promises to throw much light on the history of civilization. Anthropological researches undertaken all over the globe have shown the necessity of abandoning the old theory that a similarity of customs and superstitions, of arts and crafts, justifies the assumption of a remote relationship, if not an identity of origin, between races. It is now certain that there has ever been an inherent tendency in man, allowing for difference of climate and material surroundings, to develop culture by the same stages and in the same way. American man, for example, need not necessarily owe the minutest portion of his mental, religious, social or industrial development to remote contact with Asia or Europe, though he were proved to possess identical usages. An example in point is that of pyramid-building. No ethnical relationship can ever have existed between the Aztecs and the Egyptians; yet each race developed the idea of the pyramid tomb through that psychological similarity which is as much a characteristic of the species man as is his physique.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--J.C. Prichard, _Natural History of Man_ (London, 1843); T.H. Huxley, _Man's Place in Nature_ (London, 1863); and "Geographical Distribution of Chief Modifications of Mankind," in _Journal Ethnological Society_ for 1870; E.B. Tylor, _Early History of Man_ (London, 1865), _Primitive Culture_ (London, 1871), and _Anthropology_ (London, 1881); A. de Quatrefages, _Histoire générale des races humaines_ (Paris, 1889), _Human Species_ (Eng. trans., 1879); Lord Avebury, _Prehistoric Times_ (1865, 6th ed. 1900) and _Origin of Civilization_ (1870, 6th ed. 1902), Theo. Waitz, _Anthropologie der Naturvolker_ (1859-1871), E.H. Haeckel, _Anthropogenie_ (Leipzig, 1874-1891), Eng. trans., 1879; O. Peschel, _Volkerkunde_ (Leipzig, 1874-1897); P. Topinard, _L'Anthropologie_ (Paris, 1876); _Éleménts d'anthropologie générale_ (Paris, 1885); D.G. Brinton, _Races and Peoples_ (1890); A.H. Keane, _Ethnology_ (1896), and _Man: Past and Present_ (1899); G. Sergi, _The Mediterranean Race_ (Eng. ed., 1889); F. Ratzel, _History of Mankind_ (Eng. trans., 1897); G. de Mortillet, _Le Préhistorique_ (Paris, 1882); A.C. Haddon, _Study of Man_ (1897); J. Deniker, _The Races of Man_ (London, 1900); W.Z. Ripley, _The Races of Europe_ (1900, with long bibliography); _The Journal of the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain_; _Revue d'anthropologie_ (Paris); _Zeitschrift für Ethnologie_ (Berlin). See also bibliographies under separate ethnological headings (AUSTRALIA, AFRICA, ARABS, AMERICA, &c.). (E. B. T.)