18th century In 1758
Carl Linnaeus introduced the name
Homo sapiens as a species name in the 10th edition of his work
Systema Naturae although without a scientific description of the species-specific characteristics. Since the great apes were considered the closest relatives of human beings, based on morphological similarity, in the 19th century, it was speculated that the closest living relatives to humans were
chimpanzees (genus
Pan) and gorilla (genus
Gorilla), and based on the natural range of these creatures, it was surmised that humans shared a
common ancestor with
African apes and that
fossils of these ancestors would ultimately be found in Africa.
19th century The science arguably began in the late 19th century when important discoveries occurred that led to the study of
human evolution. The discovery of the
Neanderthal in Germany,
Thomas Huxley's ''
Evidence as to Man's Place in Nature'', and
Charles Darwin's
The Descent of Man were both important to early paleoanthropological research. The modern field of paleoanthropology began in the 19th century with the discovery of "
Neanderthal man" (the eponymous skeleton was found in 1856, but there had been finds elsewhere since 1830), and with evidence of so-called
cave men. The idea that humans are similar to certain
great apes had been obvious to people for some time, but the idea of the biological evolution of species in general was not legitimized until after
Charles Darwin published
On the Origin of Species in 1859. Though Darwin's first book on evolution did not address the specific question of human evolution—"light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history," was all Darwin wrote on the subject—the implications of evolutionary theory were clear to contemporary readers. Debates between
Thomas Huxley and
Richard Owen focused on the idea of human evolution. Huxley convincingly illustrated many of the similarities and differences between humans and apes in his 1863 book ''
Evidence as to Man's Place in Nature. By the time Darwin published his own book on the subject, Descent of Man'', it was already a well-known interpretation of his theory—and the interpretation which made the theory highly controversial. Even many of Darwin's original supporters (such as
Alfred Russel Wallace and
Charles Lyell) balked at the idea that human beings could have evolved their apparently boundless mental capacities and moral sensibilities through
natural selection.
Asia '' found in
Callao Cave, the
Philippines. Prior to the general acceptance of Africa as the root of genus
Homo, 19th-century naturalists sought the origin of humans in Asia. So-called "dragon bones" (fossil bones and teeth) from Chinese apothecary shops were known, but it was not until the early 20th century that German paleontologist,
Max Schlosser, first described a single human tooth from
Beijing. Although Schlosser (1903) was very cautious, identifying the tooth only as "?
Anthropoide g. et sp. indet?," he was hopeful that future work would discover a new anthropoid in China. Eleven years later, the Swedish geologist
Johan Gunnar Andersson was sent to China as a mining advisor and soon developed an interest in "dragon bones". It was he who, in 1918, discovered the sites around
Zhoukoudian, a village about 50 kilometers southwest of Beijing. However, because of the sparse nature of the initial finds, the site was abandoned. Work did not resume until 1921, when the Austrian paleontologist,
Otto Zdansky, fresh with his doctoral degree from Vienna, came to Beijing to work for Andersson. Zdansky conducted short-term excavations at Locality 1 in 1921 and 1923, and recovered only two teeth of significance (one premolar and one molar) that he subsequently described, cautiously, as "?
Homo sp." (Zdansky, 1927). With that done, Zdansky returned to Austria and suspended all fieldwork. News of the fossil hominin teeth delighted the scientific community in Beijing, and plans for developing a larger, more systematic project at Zhoukoudian were soon formulated. At the epicenter of excitement was
Davidson Black, a Canadian-born anatomist working at
Peking Union Medical College. Black shared Andersson’s interest, as well as his view that central Asia was a promising home for early humankind. In late 1926, Black submitted a proposal to the
Rockefeller Foundation seeking financial support for systematic excavation at Zhoukoudian and the establishment of an institute for the study of human biology in China. The
Zhoukoudian Project came into existence in the spring of 1927, and two years later, the
Cenozoic Research Laboratory of the Geological Survey of China was formally established. Being the first institution of its kind, the Cenozoic Laboratory opened up new avenues for the study of paleogeology and paleontology in China. The Laboratory was the precursor of the
Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP) of the Chinese Academy of Science, which took its modern form after 1949. The first of the major project finds are attributed to the young Swedish paleontologist,
Anders Birger Bohlin, then serving as the field advisor at
Zhoukoudian. He recovered a left lower molar that Black (1927) identified as unmistakably human (it compared favorably to the previous find made by Zdansky), and subsequently coined it
Sinanthropus pekinensis. The news was at first met with skepticism, and many scholars had reservations that a single tooth was sufficient to justify the naming of a new type of early hominin. Yet within a little more than two years, in the winter of 1929,
Pei Wenzhong, then the field director at Zhoukoudian, unearthed the first complete calvaria of
Peking Man. Twenty-seven years after Schlosser’s initial description, the antiquity of early humans in East Asia was no longer a speculation, but a reality. Excavations continued at the site and remained fruitful until the outbreak of the
Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937. The decade-long research yielded a wealth of faunal and lithic materials, as well as hominin fossils. These included 5 more complete calvaria, 9 large cranial fragments, 6 facial fragments, 14 partial mandibles, 147 isolated teeth, and 11 postcranial elements—estimated to represent as least 40 individuals. Evidence of fire, marked by ash lenses and burned bones and stones, were apparently also present, although recent studies have challenged this view.
Franz Weidenreich came to Beijing soon after Black’s untimely death in 1934, and took charge of the study of the hominin specimens. Following the loss of the Peking Man materials in late 1941, scientific endeavors at Zhoukoudian slowed, primarily because of lack of funding. Frantic search for the missing fossils took place, and continued well into the 1950s. After the establishment of the
People’s Republic of China in 1949, excavations resumed at Zhoukoudian. But with political instability and social unrest brewing in China, beginning in 1966, and major discoveries at
Olduvai Gorge and East Turkana (
Koobi Fora), the paleoanthropological spotlight shifted westward to East Africa. Although China re-opened its doors to the West in the late 1970s, national policy calling for self-reliance, coupled with a widened language barrier, thwarted all the possibilities of renewed scientific relationships. Indeed, Harvard anthropologist K. C. Chang noted, "international collaboration (in developing nations very often a disguise for Western domination) became a thing of the past" (1977: 139).
Africa ''
1920s – 1940s The first paleoanthropological find made in Africa was the 1921 discovery of the
Kabwe 1 skull at
Kabwe (Broken Hill), Zambia. Initially, this specimen was named
Homo rhodesiensis; however, today it is considered part of the species
Homo heidelbergensis. In 1924 in a limestone quarry at
Taung, Professor
Raymond Dart discovered a remarkably well-preserved juvenile specimen (face and brain endocast), which he named
Australopithecus africanus (
Australopithecus meaning "Southern Ape"). Although the brain was small (410 cm3), its shape was rounded, unlike the brain shape of chimpanzees and gorillas, and more like the shape seen in modern humans. In addition, the specimen exhibited short
canine teeth, and the anterior placement of the
foramen magnum was more like the placement seen in modern humans than the placement seen in chimpanzees and gorillas, suggesting that this species was
bipedal. All of these traits convinced Dart that the Taung child was a bipedal human ancestor, a transitional form between ape and human. However, Dart's conclusions were largely ignored for decades, as the prevailing view of the time was that a large brain evolved before bipedality. It took the discovery of additional australopith fossils in Africa that resembled his specimen, and the rejection of the
Piltdown Man hoax, for Dart's claims to be taken seriously. In the 1930s, paleontologist
Robert Broom discovered and described a new species at
Kromdraai, South Africa. Although similar in some ways to Dart's
Australopithecus africanus, Broom's specimen had much larger cheek teeth. Because of this difference, Broom named his specimen
Paranthropus robustus, using a new genus name. In doing so, he established the practice of grouping
gracile australopiths in the genus
Australopithecus and robust australopiths in the genus
Paranthropus. During the 1960s, the robust variety was commonly moved into
Australopithecus. A more recent consensus has been to return to the original classification of
Paranthropus as a separate genus.
1950s – 1990s The second half of the twentieth century saw a significant increase in the number of paleoanthropological finds made in Africa. Many of these finds were associated with the work of the
Leakey family in eastern Africa. In 1959,
Mary Leakey's discovery of the Zinj fossin (
OH 5) at
Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania, led to the identification of a new species,
Paranthropus boisei. In 1960, the Leakeys discovered the fossil
OH 7, also at Olduvai Gorge, and assigned it to a new species,
Homo habilis. In 1972, Bernard Ngeneo, a fieldworker working for
Richard Leakey, discovered the fossil KNM-ER 1470 near
Lake Turkana in Kenya. KNM-ER 1470 has been interpreted as either a distinct species,
Homo rudolfensis, or alternatively as evidence of
sexual dimorphism in
Homo habilis. In the late 1970s, Mary Leakey excavated the famous
Laetoli footprints in Tanzania, which demonstrated the antiquity of bipedality in the human lineage. In 1994, a team led by
Meave Leakey announced a new species,
Australopithecus anamensis, based on specimens found near Lake Turkana. In 1999, two new species were announced.
Berhane Asfaw and
Tim D. White named
Australopithecus garhi based on specimens discovered in Ethiopia's
Awash valley. Meave Leakey announced a new species,
Kenyanthropus platyops, based on the cranium KNM-WT 40000 from Lake Turkana. New species have also been found in eastern Africa. In 2000,
Brigitte Senut and
Martin Pickford described the species
Orrorin tugenensis, based on fossils they found in Kenya. In 2004,
Yohannes Haile-Selassie announced that some specimens previously labeled as
Ardipithecus ramidus made up a different species,
Ardipithecus kadabba. Although most hominin fossils from Africa have been found in eastern and southern Africa, there are a few exceptions. One is
Sahelanthropus tchadensis, discovered in the central African country of Chad in 2002. This find is important because it widens the assumed geographic range of early hominins. ==Renowned paleoanthropologists==