The Fossil Chronicles: How Two Controversial Discoveries Changed Our View of Human Evolution

275 Pages·2011·2.76 MB·English

by  Dean Falk

The Fossil Chronicles
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The Fossil Chronicles
How Two Controversial Discoveries
Changed Our View of Human Evolution
Dean Falk
university of california press
Berkeley Los Angeles London
University of California Press, one of the most distinguished
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University of California Press
Berkeley and Los Angeles, California
University of California Press, Ltd.
London, England
© 2011 by Dean Falk
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Falk., Dean.
The fossil chronicles : how two controversial
discoveries changed our view of human evolution / Dean
Falk.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn 978-0-520-26670-4 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Fossil hominids. 2. Flores man. 3. Australopithecines.

4. Human remains (Archaeology). 5. Human evolution—

Philosophy.  6. Paleoanthropology. I. Title.
gn282.5.f35 2011
599.93'8—dc22 2011003602

Manufactured in the United States of America
20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
In keeping with its commitment to support environmentally
responsible and sustainable printing practices, UC Press
has printed this book on Natures Book, which contains 30%
post-consumer waste and meets the minimum requirements
of ansi/niso z 39.48-1992 (r 1997) (Permanence of Paper).
For Joel Yohalem
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contents
List of Illustrations ix
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction
1
1. Of Paleopolitics and Missing Links
5
2. Taung: A Fossil to Rival Piltdown
20
3. Taung’s Checkered Past
40
4. Sulcal Skirmishes
59
5. Once upon a Hobbit
76
6. Flo’s Little Brain
109
viii / Contents
7. Sick Hobbits, Quarrelsome Scientists
135
8. Whence Homo floresiensis ?
161
9. Bones to Pick
188
Notes 199
Glossary of Neuroanatomical Terms 227
References 231
Index 253
illustrations
1. John Cooke’s oil painting The Piltdown Committee 10
2. Simplified schematic of the left side of a human cerebrum 26
3. Early photograph of Raymond Dart with the Taung fossil 30
4. Taung’s face, lower jaw, and natural endocast 31
5. Right side of Taung’s face and endocast compared with a
chimpanzee brain 35
6. Dart’s identifications of the lunate sulcus and certain functional
areas on Taung’s endocast 37
7. Author’s identifications placed directly on a copy of
Taung’s endocast 64
8. Figure 19 from Dart’s unpublished manuscript 68
9. Male hobbit, illustrated by artist Peter Schouten 78
10. Mark Moore knaps some tools at Liang Bua 85
11. Mike Morwood, 1995 91
12. Researcher Jatmiko, from the Indonesian National Research
Centre for Archaeology 93
13. Author with Charles Hildebolt and their Indonesian collaborators 97
ix