Peking Man (), also called
Sinanthropus pekinensis (currently
Homo erectus pekinensis), is an example of
Homo erectus. A group of fossil specimens was discovered in 1923-27 during excavations at
Zhoukoudian (Chou K'ou-tien) near
Beijing (known as Peking at that time),
China. More recently, the finds have been dated from roughly 500,000 years ago, although a new
26Al/
10Be dating suggests they may be as much as 680,000-780,000 years old.
Discovery and identification
Swedish geologist Johan Gunnar Andersson and
American palaeontologist Walter W. Granger came to
Zhoukoudian,
China in search of prehistoric fossils in
1921. They were directed to the site at Dragon Bone Hill by local quarrymen, where Andersson recognised deposits of quartz that were not native to the area. Immediately realising the importance of this find he turned to his colleague and announced,
"Here is primitive man, now all we have to do is find him!"Excavation work was begun immediately by Andersson's assistant
Austrian palaeontologist
Otto Zdansky, who found what appeared to be a fossilised human
molar. He returned to the site in
1923 and materials excavated in the two subsequent digs were sent back to
Uppsala University in Sweden for analysis. In
1926 Andersson announced the discovery of two human molars found in this material and Zdansky published his findings.
of
Peking Union Medical College, excited by Andersson and Zdansky’s find, secured funding from the
Rockefeller Foundation and recommenced excavations at the site in
1927 with both Western and Chinese scientists. A tooth was unearthed that fall by Swedish palaeontologist
Anders Birger Bohlin which Davidson placed in a locket around his neck.
Davidson published his analysis in the journal
Nature, identifying his find as belonging to a new species and genus which he named
Sinanthropus pekinensis, but many fellow scientists were skeptical of such an identification based on a single tooth and the Foundation demanded more specimens before they would give an additional grant.
A lower jaw, several teeth, and skull fragments were unearthed in
1928. Black presented these finds to the Foundation and was rewarded with an $80,000 grant that he used to establish the
Cenozoic Research Laboratory.
Excavations at the site under the supervision of Chinese archaeologists
Yang Zhongjian,
Pei Wenzhong, and
Jia Lanpo uncovered 200 human fossils (including 6 nearly complete
skullcaps) from more than 40 individual specimens. These excavation came to an end in
1937 with the
Japanese invasion.
Fossils of Peking Man were placed in the safe at the Cenozoic Research Laboratory of the Peking Union Medical College. Eventually, in November 1941, secretary Hu Chengzi packed up the fossils so they could be sent to
USA for safekeeping until the end of the war. They vanished en route to the port city of
Qinghuangdao.
Various parties have tried to locate the fossils, but so far they have been without result. In 1972, a US financier
Christopher Janus promised a $5,000 (USD) reward for the missing skulls; one woman contacted him, asking for $500,000 (USD) but she later vanished. In July 2005, the Chinese government founded a committee to find the bones to coincide with the 60th anniversary of the end of
World War II.
There are various theories of what might have happened, including a theory that the bones sank with the Japanese ship
Awa Maru in 1945.
Subsequent Research
Excavations at Zhoukoudian resumed after the war, and parts of another skull were found in 1966. To date a number of other partial fossil remains have been found. The Peking Man Site at Zhoukoudian was listed by
UNESCO as a
World Heritage Site in 1987. New excavations are scheduled to start at the site in the middle of May 2009.
Paleontological conclusions
The first specimens of
Homo erectus had been found in
Java in
1891 by
Eugene Dubois, but were dismissed by many as the remains of a deformed ape. The discovery of the great quantity of finds at Zhoukoudian put this to rest and
Java Man, who had initially been named
Pithecanthropus erectus, was transferred to the genus
Homo along with Peking Man.
Contiguous findings of animal remains and evidence of fire and tool usage, as well as the manufacturing of tools, were used to support
H. erectus being the first "
faber" or tool-worker. The analysis of the remains of "Peking Man" led to the claim that the Zhoukoudian and Java fossils were examples of the same broad stage of human evolution.
This interpretation was challenged in 1985 by
Lewis Binford, who claimed that the Peking Man was a
scavenger, not a
hunter. The 1998 team of
Steve Weiner of the
Weizmann Institute of Science concluded that they had not found evidence that the Peking Man had used fire.
Relation to modern Chinese people
Some Chinese paleoanthropologists have asserted in the past that the modern Chinese (and possibly other ethnic groups) are descendants of Peking Man. A recent study undertaken by Chinese geneticist
Jin Li showed that the genetic diversity of modern Chinese people is well within that of the whole world population. This suggests there was no inter-breeding between modern human immigrants to East Asia and
Homo erectus, such as Peking Man, and that the Chinese are descended from Africa, like all other modern humans, in accordance with the
Recent single-origin hypothesis, the consensus among most modern scientists. However, the
RRM2P4 gene data has been interpreted as suggesting that the Chinese, while largely descend from Africa, like all other humans, may nevertheless have some genetic legacy from hybridization with older Eurasian populations, in accordance with
multiregional evolution. The data can, however, alternatively be interpreted as showing a gene sequence which appeared in a modern human populations in Asia, rather than one inherited from earlier ancestors. Some paleontologists claim to see continuity in skeletal remains.
In popular culture
- The disappearance of Peking Man's remains, and speculation of where they ended up, is the plot of 1975-01-07 episode Season 7, Episode 160 of Hawaii Five-O, "Bones of Contention".
- Canadian science-fiction writer Robert J. Sawyer won an Aurora Award for his 1996 short story "Peking Man," which connects the lost bones to the Dracula legend; the story first appeared in the anthology Dark Destiny III: Children of Dracula edited by Edward E. Kramer, and is reprinted in Sawyer's collection Iterations.
- Peking Man is part of the central plot in the mystery Sleeping Bones by Katherine V. Forrest.
- Peking Man's bones is the subject of an episode of the Japanese Anime "Lupin the 3rd" titled: Jumping the Bones
- Peking Man is the main part of the central plot of Carolyn G. Hart's mystery novel Skulduggery, set in San Francisco's Chinatown in the early 1980s. ISBN 0-7862-2672-2
- Peking Man is a main theme within Amir D. Aczel's The Jesuit and the Skull: Teilhard de Chardin, Evolution, and the Search for Peking Man
See also
