유란시아 책
III 부. 유란시아의 역사
Paper 61
The Mammalian Era on Urantia
The Mammalian Era on Urantia
Sections
- Introduction
- § 1. The New Continental Land Stage The Age of Early Mammals
- § 2. The Recent Flood StageThe Age of Advanced Mammals
- § 3. The Modern Mountain StageAge of the Elephant and the Horse
- § 4. The Recent Continental-Elevation StageThe Last Great Mammalian Migration
- § 5. The Early Ice Age
- § 6. Primitive Man in the Ice Age
- § 7. The Continuing Ice Age
61:0.2 (693.2)
During this Cenozoic age the world’s landscape presented an attractive appearance—rolling hills, broad valleys, wide rivers, and great forests. Twice during this sector of time the Panama isthmus went up and down; three times the Bering Strait land bridge did the same. The animal types were both many and varied. The trees swarmed with birds, and the whole world was an animal paradise, notwithstanding the incessant struggle of the evolving animal species for supremacy.
61:1.1 (693.4)
50,000,000 years ago the land areas of the world were very generally above water or only slightly submerged. The formations and deposits of this period are both land and marine, but chiefly land. For a considerable time the land gradually rose but was simultaneously washed down to the lower levels and toward the seas.
61:1.2 (693.5)
Early in this period and in North America the placental type of mammals suddenly appeared, and they constituted the most important evolutionary development up to this time. Previous orders of nonplacental mammals had existed, but this new type sprang directly and suddenly from the pre-existent reptilian ancestor whose descendants had persisted on down through the times of dinosaur decline. The father of the placental mammals was a small, highly active, carnivorous, springing type of dinosaur.
45,000,000년 전에, 해안선이 매우 광범하게 가라앉은 것과 관련하여, 대륙의 중심 지대들이 융기됐다. 포유류 생명체가 급속히 진화하고 있었다. 작은 파충류, 즉 알을 낳아 번식하는 유형의 포유동물이 번성했고, 나중에 캥거루가 된 동물이 오스트랄리아에서 돌아다녔다. 오래지 않아서, 작은 말류, 발이 빠른 코뿔소류, 주둥이가 긴 맥{貘}류, 원시 돼지류, 다람쥐류, 여우원숭이류, 주머니쥐류, 그리고 원숭이처럼 생긴 여러 부류의 동물이 생겨났다. 이것들은 모두 작았고, 원시적이었고, 산악 지역에 있는 숲 속에서 살기에 가장 적합했다. 타조처럼 생기고 키가 10피트에 이르는, 땅위에서 사는 큰 새가 나타났고, 가로 9인치 세로 13인치 크기의 알을 낳았다. 이것들은 후대의 거대한 여객용 새의 조상이었는데, 이 새는 무척 영리했고, 한때 공중을 날면서 인간을 옮겨주기도 했다.
61:1.9 (694.1)
45,000,000 years ago the continental backbones were elevated in association with a very general sinking of the coast lines. Mammalian life was evolving rapidly. A small reptilian, egg-laying type of mammal flourished, and the ancestors of the later kangaroos roamed Australia. Soon there were small horses, fleet-footed rhinoceroses, tapirs with proboscises, primitive pigs, squirrels, lemurs, opossums, and several tribes of monkeylike animals. They were all small, primitive, and best suited to living among the forests of the mountain regions. A large ostrichlike land bird developed to a height of ten feet and laid an egg nine by thirteen inches. These were the ancestors of the later gigantic passenger birds that were so highly intelligent, and that onetime transported human beings through the air.
61:1.10 (694.2)
The mammals of the early Cenozoic lived on land, under the water, in the air, and among the treetops. They had from one to eleven pairs of mammary glands, and all were covered with considerable hair. In common with the later appearing orders, they developed two successive sets of teeth and possessed large brains in comparison to body size. But among them all no modern forms existed.
이 시기 후반에는 유럽 대부분이 침수됐다. 약간의 육지가 융기된 후에, 그 대륙에는 많은 호수와 만이 있었다. 북극해는 함몰된 우랄 지역을 통하여 남쪽으로 흘러서, 당시에 북쪽으로 확장돼있던 지중해, 알프스의 고지대들, 카르파티아 산맥, 아페니노 산맥, 그리고 바다 한가운데서 섬처럼 물위로 올라와있던 피레네 산맥과 연결됐다. 파나마 지협{地峽}이 융기됐고;대서양과 태평양이 분리됐다. 북 아메리카는 베링 해협의 연결육지로 아시아와 연결됐고, 그린랜드와 아이슬랜드를 통해서 유럽과 연결됐다. 북부 위도{緯度} 지역에서 땅 덩어리의 이동 경로는 오직 우랄 해협 때문에 차단됐고, 그 해협은 확장된 지중해와 함께 북극해와 연결됐다.
61:1.12 (694.4)
During the latter part of this epoch most of Europe was submerged. Following a slight land rise the continent was covered by lakes and bays. The Arctic Ocean, through the Ural depression, ran south to connect with the Mediterranean Sea as it was then expanded northward, the highlands of the Alps, Carpathians, Apennines, and Pyrenees being up above the water as islands of the sea. The Isthmus of Panama was up; the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans were separated. North America was connected with Asia by the Bering Strait land bridge and with Europe by way of Greenland and Iceland. The earth circuit of land in northern latitudes was broken only by the Ural Straits, which connected the arctic seas with the enlarged Mediterranean.
61:1.13 (694.5)
Considerable foraminiferal limestone was deposited in European waters. Today this same stone is elevated to a height of 10,000 feet in the Alps, 16,000 feet in the Himalayas, and 20,000 feet in Tibet. The chalk deposits of this period are found along the coasts of Africa and Australia, on the west coast of South America, and about the West Indies.
61:1.14 (694.6)
Throughout this so-called Eocene period the evolution of mammalian and other related forms of life continued with little or no interruption. North America was then connected by land with every continent except Australia, and the world was gradually overrun by primitive mammalian fauna of various types.
61:2.2 (694.8)
Although the early placental mammals sprang from carnivorous ancestors, very soon herbivorous branches developed, and, erelong, omnivorous mammalian families also sprang up. The angiosperms were the principal food of the rapidly increasing mammals, the modern land flora, including the majority of present-day plants and trees, having appeared during earlier periods.
61:2.3 (695.1)
35,000,000 years ago marks the beginning of the age of placental-mammalian world domination. The southern land bridge was extensive, reconnecting the then enormous Antarctic continent with South America, South Africa, and Australia. In spite of the massing of land in high latitudes, the world climate remained relatively mild because of the enormous increase in the size of the tropic seas, nor was the land elevated sufficiently to produce glaciers. Extensive lava flows occurred in Greenland and Iceland, some coal being deposited between these layers.
61:2.4 (695.2)
Marked changes were taking place in the fauna of the planet. The sea life was undergoing great modification; most of the present-day orders of marine life were in existence, and foraminifers continued to play an important role. The insect life was much like that of the previous era. The Florissant fossil beds of Colorado belong to the later years of these far-distant times. Most of the living insect families go back to this period, but many then in existence are now extinct, though their fossils remain.
61:2.5 (695.3)
On land this was pre-eminently the age of mammalian renovation and expansion. Of the earlier and more primitive mammals, over one hundred species were extinct before this period ended. Even the mammals of large size and small brain soon perished. Brains and agility had replaced armor and size in the progress of animal survival. And with the dinosaur family on the decline, the mammals slowly assumed domination of the earth, speedily and completely destroying the remainder of their reptilian ancestors.
61:2.6 (695.4)
Along with the disappearance of the dinosaurs, other and great changes occurred in the various branches of the saurian family. The surviving members of the early reptilian families are turtles, snakes, and crocodiles, together with the venerable frog, the only remaining group representative of man’s earlier ancestors.
다양한 종류의 포유동물은, 오늘날에는 사라진 어느 독특한 동물에서 기원됐다. 육식 동물이었던 이 피조물은, 고양이와 물개 사이의 잡종에 해당됐으며;땅과 물에서 살 수 있었고 상당히 영리하고 활동적이었다. 개과{犬科}의 선조가 유럽에서 진화돼 나타났고, 수많은 종{種}의 작은 개들이 곧 생겨났다. 거의 동시에, 비버, 다람쥐, 땅다람쥐, 생쥐, 토끼를 포함하여, 이로 갉아먹는 설치{楔齒} 동물이 나타나서 주목할 만한 형태의 생명체가 됐고, 이 계통들은 그후에도 거의 변하지 않았다. 이 시대의 후기 퇴적층에는, 개, 고양이, 너구리, 족제비류의 초기 형태 유골이 들어있다.
61:2.7 (695.5)
Various groups of mammals had their origin in a unique animal now extinct. This carnivorous creature was something of a cross between a cat and a seal; it could live on land or in water and was highly intelligent and very active. In Europe the ancestor of the canine family evolved, soon giving rise to many species of small dogs. About the same time the gnawing rodents, including beavers, squirrels, gophers, mice, and rabbits, appeared and soon became a notable form of life, very little change having since occurred in this family. The later deposits of this period contain the fossil remains of dogs, cats, coons, and weasels in ancestral form.
30,000,000년 전에, 현대 유형의 포유동물이 모습을 드러내기 시작했다. 이전에는 포유동물이 산에서 사는 유형이었기 때문에, 대체로 언덕에서 살았으며;무늬가 없거나 발굽을 가진 유형의, 풀을 뜯어먹는 종류들이 거기서 갑자기 진화되어 나타나기 시작했고, 발톱을 지니고 고기를 먹는 종류들도 마찬가지로 나타났다. 이것들은 풀을 뜯어먹었는데, 다섯 개의 발가락과 44개의 이빨을 가진, 분화되지 않은 한 종류에서 발생됐고, 이 동물은 이 시대가 끝나기 전에 멸종됐다. 이 기간 내내, 세 발가락 단계 이후에는 발가락의 진화가 진전되지 않았다.
61:2.8 (695.6)
30,000,000 years ago the modern types of mammals began to make their appearance. Formerly the mammals had lived for the greater part in the hills, being of the mountainous types; suddenly there began the evolution of the plains or hoofed type, the grazing species, as differentiated from the clawed flesh eaters. These grazers sprang from an undifferentiated ancestor having five toes and forty-four teeth, which perished before the end of the age. Toe evolution did not progress beyond the three-toed stage throughout this period.
진화에서 대표적인 예가 되는 말{馬}은, 빙하기 후기까지도 발달이 충분히 완성되지 못했으나, 이 기간에 북 아메리카와 유럽에서 서식했다. 반면에 코뿔소 과는 이 기간이 끝날 무렵에야 나타났지만, 곧 이어서 빠른 속도로 번식되어 퍼져나갔다. 돼지 비슷한 작은 피조물도 나타났는데, 이것은 돼지와 멧돼지와 하마에 해당하는 여러 종의 조상이 됐다. 낙타와 아메리카낙타가 이 기간 중반 경에 북 아메리카에서 생겨나서 서쪽 평원을 가득 메우게 됐다. 나중에, 아메리카낙타는 남 아메리카로, 낙타는 유럽으로 이주했고, 일부 낙타들이 빙하기까지 살아있었지만, 두 종류는 모두 북 아메리카에서 곧 사라지게 됐다.
61:2.9 (695.7)
The horse, an outstanding example of evolution, lived during these times in both North America and Europe, though his development was not fully completed until the later ice age. While the rhinoceros family appeared at the close of this period, it underwent its greatest expansion subsequently. A small hoglike creature also developed which became the ancestor of the many species of swine, peccaries, and hippopotamuses. Camels and llamas had their origin in North America about the middle of this period and overran the western plains. Later, the llamas migrated to South America, the camels to Europe, and soon both were extinct in North America, though a few camels survived up to the ice age.
61:2.10 (696.1)
About this time a notable thing occurred in western North America: The early ancestors of the ancient lemurs first made their appearance. While this family cannot be regarded as true lemurs, their coming marked the establishment of the line from which the true lemurs subsequently sprang.
61:2.11 (696.2)
Like the land serpents of a previous age which betook themselves to the seas, now a whole tribe of placental mammals deserted the land and took up their residence in the oceans. And they have ever since remained in the sea, yielding the modern whales, dolphins, porpoises, seals, and sea lions.
61:2.13 (696.4)
By the close of this Oligocene period, covering ten million years, the plant life, together with the marine life and the land animals, had very largely evolved and was present on earth much as today. Considerable specialization has subsequently appeared, but the ancestral forms of most living things were then alive.
61:3.1 (696.5)
Land elevation and sea segregation were slowly changing the world’s weather, gradually cooling it, but the climate was still mild. Sequoias and magnolias grew in Greenland, but the subtropical plants were beginning to migrate southward. By the end of this period these warm-climate plants and trees had largely disappeared from the northern latitudes, their places being taken by more hardy plants and the deciduous trees.
61:3.3 (696.7)
25,000,000 years ago there was a slight land submergence following the long epoch of land elevation. The Rocky Mountain region remained highly elevated so that the deposition of erosion material continued throughout the lowlands to the east. The Sierras were well re-elevated; in fact, they have been rising ever since. The great four-mile vertical fault in the California region dates from this time.
61:3.6 (697.1)
The huge elephants of this and subsequent periods possessed large brains as well as large bodies, and they soon overran the entire world except Australia. For once the world was dominated by a huge animal with a brain sufficiently large to enable it to carry on. Confronted by the highly intelligent life of these ages, no animal the size of an elephant could have survived unless it had possessed a brain of large size and superior quality. In intelligence and adaptation the elephant is approached only by the horse and is surpassed only by man himself. Even so, of the fifty species of elephants in existence at the opening of this period, only two have survived.
61:3.8 (697.3)
The Strait of Gibraltar closed, and Spain was connected with Africa by the old land bridge, but the Mediterranean flowed into the Atlantic through a narrow channel which extended across France, the mountain peaks and highlands appearing as islands above this ancient sea. Later on, these European seas began to withdraw. Still later, the Mediterranean was connected with the Indian Ocean, while at the close of this period the Suez region was elevated so that the Mediterranean became, for a time, an inland salt sea.
61:3.9 (697.4)
The Iceland land bridge submerged, and the arctic waters commingled with those of the Atlantic Ocean. The Atlantic coast of North America rapidly cooled, but the Pacific coast remained warmer than at present. The great ocean currents were in function and affected climate much as they do today.
포유류 생명체는 계속 진화했다. 수많은 말 떼가 북 아메리카 평원에서 낙타와 합류했고;진정으로 코끼리 시대인 동시에 말의 시대였다. 말의 뇌는 동물 자질 면에서 코끼리의 뇌 다음으로 발달해있었으나, 깜짝 놀랄 때 도망치는 고질적 성향을 극복하지 못했으므로, 그런 한 가지 면에서는 확실히 열등했다. 말은 코끼리보다 감정 통제 능력이 부족했고, 한편 코끼리의 결점은 몸체가 크고 활동적이지 못한 것이었다. 이 기간에 코끼리와 말, 이 둘을 어느 정도 닮은 한 동물이 진화되어 나타났으나, 고양이 과의 동물이 급속도로 증가하면서 곧 도태됐다.
61:3.10 (697.5)
Mammalian life continued to evolve. Enormous herds of horses joined the camels on the western plains of North America; this was truly the age of horses as well as of elephants. The horse’s brain is next in animal quality to that of the elephant, but in one respect it is decidedly inferior, for the horse never fully overcame the deep-seated propensity to flee when frightened. The horse lacks the emotional control of the elephant, while the elephant is greatly handicapped by size and lack of agility. During this period an animal evolved which was somewhat like both the elephant and the horse, but it was soon destroyed by the rapidly increasing cat family.
61:3.11 (697.6)
As Urantia is entering the so-called “horseless age,” you should pause and ponder what this animal meant to your ancestors. Men first used horses for food, then for travel, and later in agriculture and war. The horse has long served mankind and has played an important part in the development of human civilization.
61:3.12 (697.7)
The biologic developments of this period contributed much toward the setting of the stage for the subsequent appearance of man. In central Asia the true types of both the primitive monkey and the gorilla evolved, having a common ancestor, now extinct. But neither of these species is concerned in the line of living beings which were, later on, to become the ancestors of the human race.
61:3.13 (697.8)
The dog family was represented by several groups, notably wolves and foxes; the cat tribe, by panthers and large saber-toothed tigers, the latter first evolving in North America. The modern cat and dog families increased in numbers all over the world. Weasels, martens, otters, and raccoons thrived and developed throughout the northern latitudes.
10,000,000년 전에, 여러 대륙의 저지대에 국지적 퇴적층이 널리 퍼지는 시대가 시작됐지만, 이 퇴적물 대부분은 나중에 제거됐다. 이때에, 영국과 벨지움과 불란서를 포함하여 유럽의 넓은 지역은 아직 물밑에 있었고, 지중해는 북 아프리카 대부분을 덮었다. 북 아메리카에서는 광대한 퇴적 현상이 산기슭과 호수와 거대한 육상 분지 속에서 이뤄졌다. 이 퇴적층의 두께는 약 200피트에 불과하고, 다소 색깔을 띠었고, 화석은 드물게 들어있다. 두 개의 거대한 민물 호수가 북 아메리카 서쪽 지역에 있었다. 시에라 지역이 솟아오르고 있었으며;샤스타와 후드와 레이니어 지역에서는 조산{造山} 활동이 시작됐다. 그러나 차후에 있게 될 빙하시대가 돼서야 비로소, 함몰된 대서양 쪽으로 북 아메리카가 서서히 이동했다.
61:4.2 (698.4)
10,000,000 years ago began an age of widespread local land deposits on the lowlands of the continents, but most of these sedimentations were later removed. Much of Europe, at this time, was still under water, including parts of England, Belgium, and France, and the Mediterranean Sea covered much of northern Africa. In North America extensive depositions were made at the mountain bases, in lakes, and in the great land basins. These deposits average only about two hundred feet, are more or less colored, and fossils are rare. Two great fresh-water lakes existed in western North America. The Sierras were elevating; Shasta, Hood, and Rainier were beginning their mountain careers. But it was not until the subsequent ice age that North America began its creep toward the Atlantic depression.
61:4.3 (698.5)
For a short time all the land of the world was again joined excepting Australia, and the last great world-wide animal migration took place. North America was connected with both South America and Asia, and there was a free exchange of animal life. Asiatic sloths, armadillos, antelopes, and bears entered North America, while North American camels went to China. Rhinoceroses migrated over the whole world except Australia and South America, but they were extinct in the Western Hemisphere by the close of this period.
대체로, 앞에 있었던 기간에 속하는 생명체들이 계속 진화하고 퍼져나갔다. 고양이과 동물이 동물 생명체를 지배했고, 해양 생명체는 거의 답보 상태였다. 말들 중에서 다수는 여전히 세 개의 발톱을 지녔지만, 현대 유형이 나타났으며;아메리카낙타와 기린 모양의 낙타가 초원에서 말과 섞였다. 기린이 아프리카에 출현했고, 현재와 똑같은 모습의 긴 목을 가졌다. 남 아메리카에서는, 나무늘보와 아르마딜로와 개미핥기 그리고 남 아메리카 유형의 원시 원숭이들이 진화됐다. 대륙들이 최종적으로 분리되기 전에, 매스토돈이라는 거대한 동물이, 오스트랄리아를 제외한 각 지역으로 이주했다.
61:4.4 (698.6)
In general, the life of the preceding period continued to evolve and spread. The cat family dominated the animal life, and marine life was almost at a standstill. Many of the horses were still three-toed, but the modern types were arriving; llamas and giraffelike camels mingled with the horses on the grazing plains. The giraffe appeared in Africa, having just as long a neck then as now. In South America sloths, armadillos, anteaters, and the South American type of primitive monkeys evolved. Before the continents were finally isolated, those massive animals, the mastodons, migrated everywhere except to Australia.
61:4.6 (698.8)
The climate was gradually getting cooler; the land plants were slowly moving southward. At first it was the increasing cold in the north that stopped animal migrations over the northern isthmuses; subsequently these North American land bridges went down. Soon afterwards the land connection between Africa and South America finally submerged, and the Western Hemisphere was isolated much as it is today. From this time forward distinct types of life began to develop in the Eastern and Western Hemispheres.
61:5.1 (699.2)
By the close of the preceding period the lands of the northeastern part of North America and of northern Europe were highly elevated on an extensive scale, in North America vast areas rising up to 30,000 feet and more. Mild climates had formerly prevailed over these northern regions, and the arctic waters were all open to evaporation, and they continued to be ice-free until almost the close of the glacial period.
이렇게 육지가 융기함과 동시에 해류의 방향이 바뀌게 됐고, 계절풍의 방향도 바뀌었다. 이런 상황은 결국, 북부 고지대{高地帶}로 이동된, 습도가 아주 높은 대기로부터, 거의 끊임없이 비를 내리게 했다. 융기되고, 그에 따라 기온이 내려간 이 지역에 눈이 내리기 시작했고, 2만 피트의 깊이가 될 때까지 계속 떨어졌다. 고도가 높고 눈이 가장 많이 쌓인 지역들은, 나중에 빙하가 그 압력으로 인해 이동하게 되는 중심점이 됐다. 그리고 빙하기는, 엄청난 눈이 이 북부 고지대들에 계속 내려서 거대한 눈 덩어리가 형성될 때까지 계속됐고, 눈 덩어리는 곧 고체로 변하여, 서서히 움직이는 얼음 덩어리가 됐다.
61:5.2 (699.3)
Simultaneously with these land elevations the ocean currents shifted, and the seasonal winds changed their direction. These conditions eventually produced an almost constant precipitation of moisture from the movement of the heavily saturated atmosphere over the northern highlands. Snow began to fall on these elevated and therefore cool regions, and it continued to fall until it had attained a depth of 20,000 feet. The areas of the greatest depth of snow, together with altitude, determined the central points of subsequent glacial pressure flows. And the ice age persisted just as long as this excessive precipitation continued to cover these northern highlands with this enormous mantle of snow, which soon metamorphosed into solid but creeping ice.
61:5.3 (699.4)
The great ice sheets of this period were all located on elevated highlands, not in mountainous regions where they are found today. One half of the glacial ice was in North America, one fourth in Eurasia, and one fourth elsewhere, chiefly in Antarctica. Africa was little affected by the ice, but Australia was almost covered with the antarctic ice blanket.
61:5.4 (699.5)
The northern regions of this world have experienced six separate and distinct ice invasions, although there were scores of advances and recessions associated with the activity of each individual ice sheet. The ice in North America collected in two and, later, three centers. Greenland was covered, and Iceland was completely buried beneath the ice flow. In Europe the ice at various times covered the British Isles excepting the coast of southern England, and it overspread western Europe down to France.
61:5.5 (699.6)
2,000,000 years ago the first North American glacier started its southern advance. The ice age was now in the making, and this glacier consumed nearly one million years in its advance from, and retreat back toward, the northern pressure centers. The central ice sheet extended south as far as Kansas; the eastern and western ice centers were not then so extensive.
61:5.6 (699.7)
1,500,000 years ago the first great glacier was retreating northward. In the meantime, enormous quantities of snow had been falling on Greenland and on the northeastern part of North America, and erelong this eastern ice mass began to flow southward. This was the second invasion of the ice.
61:5.7 (699.8)
These first two ice invasions were not extensive in Eurasia. During these early epochs of the ice age North America was overrun with mastodons, woolly mammoths, horses, camels, deer, musk oxen, bison, ground sloths, giant beavers, saber-toothed tigers, sloths as large as elephants, and many groups of the cat and dog families. But from this time forward they were rapidly reduced in numbers by the increasing cold of the glacial period. Toward the close of the ice age the majority of these animal species were extinct in North America.
61:5.8 (700.1)
Away from the ice the land and water life of the world was little changed. Between the ice invasions the climate was about as mild as at present, perhaps a little warmer. The glaciers were, after all, local phenomena, though they spread out to cover enormous areas. The coastwise climate varied greatly between the times of glacial inaction and those times when enormous icebergs were sliding off the coast of Maine into the Atlantic, slipping out through Puget Sound into the Pacific, and thundering down Norwegian fiords into the North Sea.
이런 빙하시대의 중대한 사건은 원시인의 진화였다. 현재는 물속에 잠겨있는 약간 서쪽 인도 지역에서, 아시아로 이주한 고대 북 아메리카 여우원숭이 유형의 후손 가운데서, 시조{始祖} 포유동물이 갑자기 나타났다. 이 작은 동물은 대개 뒷다리만 이용해서 걸어 다녔고, 몸체에 비해서 그리고 다른 동물들의 뇌에 비해서 큰 뇌를 갖고 있었다. 이런 종류의 생명체의 70대 후손 중에서, 새로운 상류 동물 집단이 갑자기 분화됐다. 이런 새로운 중간-포유동물--곧 크기와 키가 그 선조보다 거의 두 배에 달하고, 균형 있게 증대된 두뇌 능력을 지닌 동물--이 만족스런 상태로 자리잡게 됐을 때, 지극히 중대한 세 번째 돌연변이인 영장류{靈長類}가 갑자기 나타났다. (이와 동시에, 중간-포유동물 혈통 속에는 퇴화가 전개되어 유인원{類人猿}의 조상이 됐으며;그날 이후로 이런 인류 계통은 점진적인 진화 과정에 들어간 반면, 유인원 부류는 그 상태로 남아있거나 실제적인 퇴화 과정을 거치게 됐다.)
61:6.1 (700.2)
The great event of this glacial period was the evolution of primitive man. Slightly to the west of India, on land now under water and among the offspring of Asiatic migrants of the older North American lemur types, the dawn mammals suddenly appeared. These small animals walked mostly on their hind legs, and they possessed large brains in proportion to their size and in comparison with the brains of other animals. In the seventieth generation of this order of life a new and higher group of animals suddenly differentiated. These new mid-mammals—almost twice the size and height of their ancestors and possessing proportionately increased brain power—had only well established themselves when the Primates, the third vital mutation, suddenly appeared. (At this same time, a retrograde development within the mid-mammal stock gave origin to the simian ancestry; and from that day to this the human branch has gone forward by progressive evolution, while the simian tribes have remained stationary or have actually retrogressed.)
61:6.3 (700.4)
This event occurred at about the time of the beginning of the third glacial advance; thus it may be seen that your early ancestors were born and bred in a stimulating, invigorating, and difficult environment. And the sole survivors of these Urantia aborigines, the Eskimos, even now prefer to dwell in frigid northern climes.
61:6.4 (700.5)
Human beings were not present in the Western Hemisphere until near the close of the ice age. But during the interglacial epochs they passed westward around the Mediterranean and soon overran the continent of Europe. In the caves of western Europe may be found human bones mingled with the remains of both tropic and arctic animals, testifying that man lived in these regions throughout the later epochs of the advancing and retreating glaciers.
빙하기 내내 다른 활동도 진척됐지만, 얼음 층의 작용 때문에 북쪽 위도 지방에서는 다른 현상이 나타나지 못했다. 다른 어떤 육상 활동도, 이때만큼 지형학적으로 그런 독자적인 증거를 남겨놓지 못했다. 특이한 표석{漂石 빙하 작용으로 운반되었다가 빙하가 녹은 후 그대로 남아있는 바위}, 그리고 웅덩이, 호수, 치환된 암석, 및 돌가루 등과 같은 지표면의 균열은, 다른 자연 현상에서는 발견되지 않는다. 또한 그 얼음 층은 빙퇴구{氷堆丘}로 알려진, 완만하게 솟거나 지표면의 굽이치는 현상을 낳기도 했다. 빙하가 전진하면서 강줄기를 바꾸고, 지구 표면 전체를 변화시켰다. 그리고 빙하는, 이동된 흔적만--곧 바닥과 측면 그리고 끝나는 지점의 빙퇴석{氷堆石}들만-- 뒤에 남겨놓았다. 이 유동 현상들, 특히 바닥의 빙퇴석은, 북 아메리카의 동쪽 해안선으로부터 북쪽과 서쪽으로 뻗었고, 유럽과 시베리아에서 발견된다.
61:7.1 (700.6)
Throughout the glacial period other activities were in progress, but the action of the ice overshadows all other phenomena in the northern latitudes. No other terrestrial activity leaves such characteristic evidence on the topography. The distinctive boulders and surface cleavages, such as potholes, lakes, displaced stone, and rock flour, are to be found in connection with no other phenomenon in nature. The ice is also responsible for those gentle swells, or surface undulations, known as drumlins. And a glacier, as it advances, displaces rivers and changes the whole face of the earth. Glaciers alone leave behind them those telltale drifts—the ground, lateral, and terminal moraines. These drifts, particularly the ground moraines, extend from the eastern seaboard north and westward in North America and are found in Europe and Siberia.
61:7.2 (701.1)
750,000 years ago the fourth ice sheet, a union of the North American central and eastern ice fields, was well on its way south; at its height it reached to southern Illinois, displacing the Mississippi River fifty miles to the west, and in the east it extended as far south as the Ohio River and central Pennsylvania.
61:7.4 (701.3)
500,000 years ago, during the fifth advance of the ice, a new development accelerated the course of human evolution. Suddenly and in one generation the six colored races mutated from the aboriginal human stock. This is a doubly important date since it also marks the arrival of the Planetary Prince.
61:7.5 (701.4)
In North America the advancing fifth glacier consisted of a combined invasion by all three ice centers. The eastern lobe, however, extended only a short distance below the St. Lawrence valley, and the western ice sheet made little southern advance. But the central lobe reached south to cover most of the state of Iowa. In Europe this invasion of the ice was not so extensive as the preceding one.
61:7.7 (701.6)
In this invasion the three great ice sheets coalesced into one vast ice mass, and all of the western mountains participated in this glacial activity. This was the largest of all ice invasions in North America; the ice moved south over fifteen hundred miles from its pressure centers, and North America experienced its lowest temperatures.
61:7.9 (701.8)
150,000 years ago the sixth and last glacier reached its farthest points of southern extension, the western ice sheet crossing just over the Canadian border; the central coming down into Kansas, Missouri, and Illinois; the eastern sheet advancing south and covering the greater portion of Pennsylvania and Ohio.
이것은 여러 개의 혀 모양 곧 얼음 돌출부들을 앞으로 밀어낸 빙하인데, 이것이 오늘날의 크고 작은 호수를 만들었다. 이 빙하가 퇴각하는 동안, 북 아메리카의 5대호 체계가 형성됐다. 그리고 유란시아 지질학자들은 이런 다양한 발달 단계를 매우 정확하게 추론했고, 이런 많은 양의 물이, 여러 차례에 걸쳐서, 처음에는 미시시피 계곡으로, 그다음에는 동쪽으로 허드슨 계곡에, 마지막으로는 북쪽 길을 통해서 세인트 로렌스로 흘러 들어갔다는 사실을 정확하게 추론했다. 5대호가 현재의 나이아가라 방향으로 흐르기 시작한 지 37,000년이 지났다.
61:7.10 (701.9)
This is the glacier that sent forth the many tongues, or ice lobes, which carved out the present-day lakes, great and small. During its retreat the North American system of Great Lakes was produced. And Urantian geologists have very accurately deduced the various stages of this development and have correctly surmised that these bodies of water did, at different times, empty first into the Mississippi valley, then eastward into the Hudson valley, and finally by a northern route into the St. Lawrence. It is thirty-seven thousand years since the connected Great Lakes system began to empty out over the present Niagara route.
61:7.11 (702.1)
100,000 years ago, during the retreat of the last glacier, the vast polar ice sheets began to form, and the center of ice accumulation moved considerably northward. And as long as the polar regions continue to be covered with ice, it is hardly possible for another glacial age to occur, regardless of future land elevations or modification of ocean currents.
61:7.13 (702.1)
The rigorous glacial period destroyed many species and radically changed numerous others. Many were sorely sifted by the to-and-fro migration which was made necessary by the advancing and retreating ice. Those animals which followed the glaciers back and forth over the land were the bear, bison, reindeer, musk ox, mammoth, and mastodon.
61:7.14 (702.1)
The mammoth sought the open prairies, but the mastodon preferred the sheltered fringes of the forest regions. The mammoth, until a late date, ranged from Mexico to Canada; the Siberian variety became wool covered. The mastodon persisted in North America until exterminated by the red man much as the white man later killed off the bison.
61:7.16 (702.1)
The enforced migration of life before the advancing ice led to an extraordinary commingling of plants and of animals, and with the retreat of the final ice invasion, many arctic species of both plants and animals were left stranded high upon certain mountain peaks, whither they had journeyed to escape destruction by the glacier. And so, today, these dislocated plants and animals may be found high up on the Alps of Europe and even on the Appalachian Mountains of North America.
61:7.18 (702.1)
35,000 years ago marks the termination of the great ice age excepting in the polar regions of the planet. This date is also significant in that it approximates the arrival of a Material Son and Daughter and the beginning of the Adamic dispensation, roughly corresponding to the beginning of the Holocene or postglacial period.