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Lantian Man
Lantian Man (simplified Chinese: 蓝田人; traditional Chinese: 藍田人; pinyin: Lántián rén), Homo erectus lantianensis) is a subspecies of Homo erectus known from an almost complete mandible from Chenchiawo (陈家窝) Village discovered in 1963, and a partial skull from Gongwangling (公王岭) Village discovered in 1964, situated in Lantian County on the Loess Plateau. The former dates to about 710–684 thousand years ago, and the latter 1.65–1.59 million years ago. This makes Lantian Man the second-oldest firmly dated H. erectus beyond Africa (after H. e. georgicus), and the oldest in East Asia. The fossils were first described by Woo Ju-Kan in 1964, who considered the subspecies an ancestor to Peking Man (H. e. pekinensis).
Like Peking Man, Lantian Man has a heavy brow ridge, a receding forehead, possibly a sagittal keel running across the midline of the skull, and exorbitantly thickened bone. The skull is small by absolute measure, and has narrower postorbital constriction. The teeth are proportionally large compared to other Asian H. erectus. The brain volume of the Gongwangling skull is about 780 cc, similar to contemporary archaic humans in Africa, but much smaller than later Asian H. erectus and modern humans.
Lantian Man inhabited the mild grasslands at the northern base of the Qinling Mountains. For stone tools, Lantian Man manufactured mainly heavy-duty tools including choppers, spheroids, heavy-duty scrapers, handaxes, picks, cleavers. The latter three are characteristic of the Acheulean industry, which is usually only applied to African and Western Eurasian sites. It appears the Acheulean persisted far longer in this region than elsewhere.
On July 19, 1963, a team funded by the Chinese Institute of Vertebrate Palaeontology and Palaeoanthropology (IVPP) recovered a fossil human mandible (lower jawbone) outside Chenchiawo Village, Lantian County in the Shaanxi Province of Northwest China. It was found in the bottom end of a 30 m (98 ft) thick layer of reddish clays, atop a metre-thick (3 ft) layer of gravel. Lantian is situated on the Loess Plateau, which is geologically stratified into alternating units of loess (wind-blown sediment deposits) and paleosol (soil deposits). The mandible was formally described by Chinese palaeoanthropologist Woo Ju-Kan (吴汝康) in 1964, who noted its similarity to the Peking Man (at the time "Sinanthropus" pekinensis), and provisionally classified it as "Sinanthropus" lantianensis. This spurred further investigation of Lantian County, which recovered a human tooth by the end of the May 1964 and the rest of the skull by October, at the Gongwangling site at the foothills of the Qinling Mountains. Woo also assigned it to "S." lantianensis, but later that year, he recognised the genus was falling out of favour and was being synonymised with Homo erectus. He recommended the combination Homo erectus lantianensis. Nonetheless, the skull is too distorted to morphologically assess Lantian Man's relationship with other H. erectus populations, so it is unclear if Lantian Man and Peking Man are more closely related to each other than Java Man (H. e. erectus).
The discovery of Lantian Man was in the midst of an ever-increasing number of Chinese fossil ape sites, bringing the country to the forefront of anthropological discussions, beyond the capital's famous Peking Man. These were publicised in local site museums constructed in the 1980's and 1990's; Lantian Man became one such spectacle for the Shaanxi History Museum.
Lantian Man was early on recognised as being older than Peking Man on purely morphological grounds. In 1973, American anthropologists Jean Aigner and William S. Laughlin suggested the Chenchiawo site was deposited 300,000 years ago and the Gongwangling site 700,000 years ago based on the animal remains (biostratigraphy), constrained to the Middle Pleistocene. In 1978, Chinese palaeoanthropologist Ma Xinghua and colleagues estimated, respectively, 650,000 and 750 to 800 thousand years ago using palaeomagnetism, extending into the Early Pleistocene. Using the same methods later that year, Chinese palaeoanthropologist Cheng Gouliang and colleagues instead reported 500,000 and 1 million years ago. In 1984, Chinese palaeoanthropologists Liu Dongsheng and Ding Menglin suggested the layers date to 500 to 690 thousand and 730 to 800 thousand years ago. In 1989, Chinese palaeoanthropologists An Zhisheng and Ho Chuan Kun stratigraphically placed the Chenchiawo at Palaeosol Unit 5 and the Gongwangling skull to Loess Unit 15, and palaeomagnetically dated them to 650,000 and 1.15 million years ago. This made Lantian Man the oldest firmly dated Asian human species at the time.
An and Ho's dates became widely used, but in 2015, Chinese palaeoanthropologist Zhu-Yu Zhu and colleagues noticed a discontinuity in the stratigraphy, which put the Chenchiawo mandible in Palaeosol Unit 6, and the Gongwangling skull all the way down in Palaeosol Unit 23. This makes them 1.65–1.59 million and 710–684 thousand years old. Lantian Man is then roughly contemporaneous with the earliest humans to leave Africa: the 1.75 million year old Dmanisi humans (H. e. georgicus), the 1.6–1.5 million year old Sangiran humans (H. e. erectus), and the 1.7–1.4 million year old Yuanmou Man (H. e. yuanmouensis). In 2018, Zhu reported 2.1 million year old stone tools at the Shangchen site in Lantian. Such early dates indicate H. erectus rapidly dispersed across the Old World once out of Africa. In 2011, Indonesian palaeoanthropologist Yahdi Zaim and colleagues suggested the open habitats of China and Southeast Asia were colonised by two distinct waves of H. erectus based on dental anatomy, separated by a rainforest belt south of the Qinling Mountains.
The Gongwangling skull is relatively complete, and comprises the frontal bone (forehead), most of the parietal bones (top of the head), the right temporal bone (sides of the head), the bottom margins of the nasal bones (between the eyes), and pieces of the maxillae (upper jaws). It is a bit distorted, with the right orbit jutting out farther than the left, several elements are slightly flattened, the depressions and the middle of the frontal bone are craggy due to corrosion, and the left parietal flexes out a bit more than normal. Based on the size and wearing of the molars (and assuming they degrade faster than those of modern humans), Woo estimated the individual was a 30 year old female. Overall, the skull is quite archaic, according to Woo reminiscent of the contemporary Mojokerto skull from Java. Woo calculated a brain volume of about 780 cc, which is quite small for H. erectus. For comparison, later Asian H. erectus average roughly 1,000 cc, and present-day modern humans 1,270 cc for males and 1,130 cc for females. Contemporary African archaic humans (H. habilis, H. rudolfensis, and H. e? ergaster) ranged from 500–900 cc.
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Lantian Man
Lantian Man (simplified Chinese: 蓝田人; traditional Chinese: 藍田人; pinyin: Lántián rén), Homo erectus lantianensis) is a subspecies of Homo erectus known from an almost complete mandible from Chenchiawo (陈家窝) Village discovered in 1963, and a partial skull from Gongwangling (公王岭) Village discovered in 1964, situated in Lantian County on the Loess Plateau. The former dates to about 710–684 thousand years ago, and the latter 1.65–1.59 million years ago. This makes Lantian Man the second-oldest firmly dated H. erectus beyond Africa (after H. e. georgicus), and the oldest in East Asia. The fossils were first described by Woo Ju-Kan in 1964, who considered the subspecies an ancestor to Peking Man (H. e. pekinensis).
Like Peking Man, Lantian Man has a heavy brow ridge, a receding forehead, possibly a sagittal keel running across the midline of the skull, and exorbitantly thickened bone. The skull is small by absolute measure, and has narrower postorbital constriction. The teeth are proportionally large compared to other Asian H. erectus. The brain volume of the Gongwangling skull is about 780 cc, similar to contemporary archaic humans in Africa, but much smaller than later Asian H. erectus and modern humans.
Lantian Man inhabited the mild grasslands at the northern base of the Qinling Mountains. For stone tools, Lantian Man manufactured mainly heavy-duty tools including choppers, spheroids, heavy-duty scrapers, handaxes, picks, cleavers. The latter three are characteristic of the Acheulean industry, which is usually only applied to African and Western Eurasian sites. It appears the Acheulean persisted far longer in this region than elsewhere.
On July 19, 1963, a team funded by the Chinese Institute of Vertebrate Palaeontology and Palaeoanthropology (IVPP) recovered a fossil human mandible (lower jawbone) outside Chenchiawo Village, Lantian County in the Shaanxi Province of Northwest China. It was found in the bottom end of a 30 m (98 ft) thick layer of reddish clays, atop a metre-thick (3 ft) layer of gravel. Lantian is situated on the Loess Plateau, which is geologically stratified into alternating units of loess (wind-blown sediment deposits) and paleosol (soil deposits). The mandible was formally described by Chinese palaeoanthropologist Woo Ju-Kan (吴汝康) in 1964, who noted its similarity to the Peking Man (at the time "Sinanthropus" pekinensis), and provisionally classified it as "Sinanthropus" lantianensis. This spurred further investigation of Lantian County, which recovered a human tooth by the end of the May 1964 and the rest of the skull by October, at the Gongwangling site at the foothills of the Qinling Mountains. Woo also assigned it to "S." lantianensis, but later that year, he recognised the genus was falling out of favour and was being synonymised with Homo erectus. He recommended the combination Homo erectus lantianensis. Nonetheless, the skull is too distorted to morphologically assess Lantian Man's relationship with other H. erectus populations, so it is unclear if Lantian Man and Peking Man are more closely related to each other than Java Man (H. e. erectus).
The discovery of Lantian Man was in the midst of an ever-increasing number of Chinese fossil ape sites, bringing the country to the forefront of anthropological discussions, beyond the capital's famous Peking Man. These were publicised in local site museums constructed in the 1980's and 1990's; Lantian Man became one such spectacle for the Shaanxi History Museum.
Lantian Man was early on recognised as being older than Peking Man on purely morphological grounds. In 1973, American anthropologists Jean Aigner and William S. Laughlin suggested the Chenchiawo site was deposited 300,000 years ago and the Gongwangling site 700,000 years ago based on the animal remains (biostratigraphy), constrained to the Middle Pleistocene. In 1978, Chinese palaeoanthropologist Ma Xinghua and colleagues estimated, respectively, 650,000 and 750 to 800 thousand years ago using palaeomagnetism, extending into the Early Pleistocene. Using the same methods later that year, Chinese palaeoanthropologist Cheng Gouliang and colleagues instead reported 500,000 and 1 million years ago. In 1984, Chinese palaeoanthropologists Liu Dongsheng and Ding Menglin suggested the layers date to 500 to 690 thousand and 730 to 800 thousand years ago. In 1989, Chinese palaeoanthropologists An Zhisheng and Ho Chuan Kun stratigraphically placed the Chenchiawo at Palaeosol Unit 5 and the Gongwangling skull to Loess Unit 15, and palaeomagnetically dated them to 650,000 and 1.15 million years ago. This made Lantian Man the oldest firmly dated Asian human species at the time.
An and Ho's dates became widely used, but in 2015, Chinese palaeoanthropologist Zhu-Yu Zhu and colleagues noticed a discontinuity in the stratigraphy, which put the Chenchiawo mandible in Palaeosol Unit 6, and the Gongwangling skull all the way down in Palaeosol Unit 23. This makes them 1.65–1.59 million and 710–684 thousand years old. Lantian Man is then roughly contemporaneous with the earliest humans to leave Africa: the 1.75 million year old Dmanisi humans (H. e. georgicus), the 1.6–1.5 million year old Sangiran humans (H. e. erectus), and the 1.7–1.4 million year old Yuanmou Man (H. e. yuanmouensis). In 2018, Zhu reported 2.1 million year old stone tools at the Shangchen site in Lantian. Such early dates indicate H. erectus rapidly dispersed across the Old World once out of Africa. In 2011, Indonesian palaeoanthropologist Yahdi Zaim and colleagues suggested the open habitats of China and Southeast Asia were colonised by two distinct waves of H. erectus based on dental anatomy, separated by a rainforest belt south of the Qinling Mountains.
The Gongwangling skull is relatively complete, and comprises the frontal bone (forehead), most of the parietal bones (top of the head), the right temporal bone (sides of the head), the bottom margins of the nasal bones (between the eyes), and pieces of the maxillae (upper jaws). It is a bit distorted, with the right orbit jutting out farther than the left, several elements are slightly flattened, the depressions and the middle of the frontal bone are craggy due to corrosion, and the left parietal flexes out a bit more than normal. Based on the size and wearing of the molars (and assuming they degrade faster than those of modern humans), Woo estimated the individual was a 30 year old female. Overall, the skull is quite archaic, according to Woo reminiscent of the contemporary Mojokerto skull from Java. Woo calculated a brain volume of about 780 cc, which is quite small for H. erectus. For comparison, later Asian H. erectus average roughly 1,000 cc, and present-day modern humans 1,270 cc for males and 1,130 cc for females. Contemporary African archaic humans (H. habilis, H. rudolfensis, and H. e? ergaster) ranged from 500–900 cc.
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