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Adventurer
Joined: 28 Jan 2006
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 Posted: Mon Apr 02, 2007 7:34 pm Post subject: Ancient human unearthed in China |
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Last Updated: Monday, 2 April 2007, 21:50 GMT 22:50 UK
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Ancient human unearthed in China
The remains include a lower jaw as well as leg bones
The remains of one of the earliest modern humans to inhabit eastern Asia have been unearthed in a cave in China.
The find could shed light on how our ancestors colonised the East, a movement that is only poorly understood by anthropologists.
Researchers found 34 bone fragments belonging to a single individual at the Tianyuan Cave, near Beijing.
Details of the discovery appear in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal.
Radiocarbon dates, obtained directly from the bones, show the person lived between 42,000 and 39,000 years ago.
"For this time period, which is critical for understanding the spread of modern humans around the world, we have two well-dated human fossils from eastern Asia," said co-author Professor Erik Trinkaus, from Washington University in St Louis, US.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6518527.stm |
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stevemcgarrett
Joined: 24 Mar 2006
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| Posted: Mon Apr 02, 2007 7:41 pm Post subject: |
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Interesting, Adventurer. Thanks for the heads-up. Are they labeling this another Peking Man find, or some other species?
Sure wish they could find the lost remains of Peking Man from Zhoukoudian that the Japanese stole during the war. |
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gang ah jee
Joined: 14 Jan 2003
Location: city of paper
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| Posted: Mon Apr 02, 2007 7:50 pm Post subject: |
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| stevemcgarrett wrote: |
| Interesting, Adventurer. Thanks for the heads-up. Are they labeling this another Peking Man find, or some other species? |
This one is clearly Homo sapiens - that's why they're calling it 'human'. Peking Man is a subspecies of Homo erectus and predates this find by a couple of hundred thousand years. |
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EFLtrainer
Joined: 04 May 2005
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| Posted: Mon Apr 02, 2007 8:06 pm Post subject: |
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| At that time frame, it really couldn't be anything other than human, eh? |
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igotthisguitar
Joined: 08 Apr 2003
Location: South Korea (Permanent Vacation)
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gang ah jee
Joined: 14 Jan 2003
Location: city of paper
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| Posted: Mon Apr 02, 2007 9:44 pm Post subject: |
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No. No connection. |
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igotthisguitar
Joined: 08 Apr 2003
Location: South Korea (Permanent Vacation)
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| Posted: Mon Apr 02, 2007 10:02 pm Post subject: |
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| gang ah jee wrote: |
No. No connection. |
Oh, that's too bad.
You familiar with this then?
Tarim Mummies
A Tarim Basin mummy photographed by Aurel Stein circa 1910.
The Tarim mummies are a series of mummies which have been excavated in the Tarim Basin (Eastern Central Asia, today the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of the People's Republic of China), and dated to the 2nd and 1st millennium BC.
Some tests[1][verification needed] have found the mummies to contain Caucasoid genes, confirming the earlier suggestion that the mummies are of at least partial West Asian descent and giving further support to the idea of migrations of speakers of Indo-European languages at a very early period, suggesting the possibility of cultural exchange with the Chinese world since around 1st millennium BC  |
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gang ah jee
Joined: 14 Jan 2003
Location: city of paper
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| Posted: Mon Apr 02, 2007 10:06 pm Post subject: |
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| igotthisguitar wrote: |
| gang ah jee wrote: |
No. No connection. |
Oh, that's too bad.
You familiar with this then?
Tarim Mummies
A Tarim Basin mummy photographed by Aurel Stein circa 1910.
The Tarim mummies are a series of mummies which have been excavated in the Tarim Basin (Eastern Central Asia, today the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of the People's Republic of China), and dated to the 2nd and 1st millennium BC.
Some tests[1][verification needed] have found the mummies to contain Caucasoid genes, confirming the earlier suggestion that the mummies are of at least partial West Asian descent and giving further support to the idea of migrations of speakers of Indo-European languages at a very early period, suggesting the possibility of cultural exchange with the Chinese world since around 1st millennium BC |
West Asians in China 2000 years ago? My mind is blown.
(IGTG, you're aware that the Tajiks immediately to the west of the Tarim Basin are 'caucasoid' and speak Tajik Persian - an Indo-European language) |
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Manner of Speaking
Joined: 09 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Mon Apr 02, 2007 11:10 pm Post subject: |
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Get a tape measure, go outside to a sidewalk, or in the library to a very long table.
Measure out four inches.
That represents the time from the Tarim Basin Mummies until now.
Then measure out 3.5 feet.
That represents the time from the remains recently found in China, until now.
Then measure out 16.7 feet.
That represents the time from Peking Man, until now. |
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stevemcgarrett
Joined: 24 Mar 2006
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| Posted: Tue Apr 03, 2007 2:44 am Post subject: |
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gang ah jee
| Quote: |
| This one is clearly Homo sapiens - that's why they're calling it 'human'. Peking Man is a subspecies of Homo erectus and predates this find by a couple of hundred thousand years. |
Gee, thanks for pointing that out.  Sometimes "human" is used loosely as is "ancient" (as opposed to prehistoric, etc.). But then I've only written a series of articles for graded EFL readers about Peking Man for Chinese students after interviewing some of the paleoanthropologists on the actual digs at Zhoukoudian so, hey, what do I know.
That said, I only skimmed over the OP's original post and didn't catch the time frame at the end of it. But thanks for edubacating me all the same Manner of Speaking. I can always count on you to clean up my poop. |
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gang ah jee
Joined: 14 Jan 2003
Location: city of paper
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| Posted: Tue Apr 03, 2007 3:08 am Post subject: |
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| stevemcgarrett wrote: |
| gang ah jeeGee, thanks for pointing that out. Sometimes "human" is used loosely as is "ancient" (as opposed to prehistoric, etc.). But then I've only written a series of articles for graded EFL readers about Peking Man for Chinese students after interviewing some of the paleoanthropologists on the actual digs at Zhoukoudian so, hey, what do I know. |
My apologies. I should have known that you once interviewed some ancient scientists about an 80 year-old dig and that you hadn't bothered actually reading the article. After all, the phrase 'modern human' was buried all the way down in the first sentence, so I can understand how someone could miss it. |
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stevemcgarrett
Joined: 24 Mar 2006
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| Posted: Tue Apr 03, 2007 3:25 am Post subject: |
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gang ah jee sniped:
| Quote: |
| After all, the phrase 'modern human' was buried all the way down in the first sentence, so I can understand how someone could miss it. |
Er--it's in the second sentence--and, yes, I just skimmed over it. Sorry this oversight troubles you so deeply. Perhaps a visit to Dr. Porn's Clinic can revitalize you. Just PM freethought. |
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gang ah jee
Joined: 14 Jan 2003
Location: city of paper
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| Posted: Tue Apr 03, 2007 3:48 am Post subject: |
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| stevemcgarrett wrote: |
| Er--it's in the second sentence |
It's the first sentence. The line above it is a caption from an image on the BBC page.
Really though, if you're interested in paleoanthropology you should check out the original article - the small part that Adventurer posted misses all of the interesting stuff. Basically, it appears that the new find may combine archaic and modern features in a way not previously seen before, which raises questions about interbreeding between archaic and modern humans in the region. It may be that the out-of-Africa hypothesis for the origins of modern humans is not the full story. |
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Manner of Speaking
Joined: 09 Jan 2003
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| Posted: Tue Apr 03, 2007 4:57 am Post subject: |
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gang ah jee...my previous post, did it come across as EITHER sarcastic OR directed at one particular person?
The timescales of Anthropology have always fascinated me...I've been reading stuff recently on Proto-Indo-European, estimated to have emerged around 4500 BCE. That's 6500 years, from PIE to Ebonics. The remains found in China are 8-10 times as old.
So much of human prehistory we know so little about. Which was all I was commenting on. |
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Adventurer
Joined: 28 Jan 2006
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| Posted: Tue Apr 03, 2007 7:34 am Post subject: |
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| igotthisguitar wrote: |
| gang ah jee wrote: |
No. No connection. |
Oh, that's too bad.
You familiar with this then?
Tarim Mummies
A Tarim Basin mummy photographed by Aurel Stein circa 1910.
The Tarim mummies are a series of mummies which have been excavated in the Tarim Basin (Eastern Central Asia, today the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of the People's Republic of China), and dated to the 2nd and 1st millennium BC.
Some tests[1][verification needed] have found the mummies to contain Caucasoid genes, confirming the earlier suggestion that the mummies are of at least partial West Asian descent and giving further support to the idea of migrations of speakers of Indo-European languages at a very early period, suggesting the possibility of cultural exchange with the Chinese world since around 1st millennium BC |
In answer to what Steve said, you're welcome, but I think it is too early to say what these bones will tell us. The researchers were talking about the mixture of different human species.
As far as Western China, that this poster brought up, I did read many years back of Caucasian tribesmen going East all the way to China, so I wasn't surprised about these mummies in Western China. |
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