Early Modern Human from Tianyuan Cave, China

Preface

ix The karstic area around Zhoukoudian has been famous since the discoveries there in the 1920s and 1930s of Middle and Late Pleistocene human remains, abundant faunal remains, and archeological assemblages. This fame, which was justified both by the nature of the discoveries and by the classic monographs written on the sites and their contents during the 1930s and 1940s, was enhanced by the mystery that still surrounds the disappearance of the human fossils during World War II. Subsequent work at the well-known Locality 1, and at various localities surrounding it, has produced additional human remains, archeological materials, and considerable clarification of the geological ages and formation processes of the deposits. But the human fossils have been few and fragmentary compared to the specimens from the early excavations, and the site has become as much a monument to the history of paleoanthropology in China as a locale for scientific investigations. It is in this context that the discovery of fossil human bones and Pleistocene fauna, in June of 2001 in a small cave (Tianyuandong—Tianyuan Cave) 6 km from Locality 1, takes on significance. Initially investigated by the owners of the Tianyuan Tree Farm and subsequently excavated systematically by a team from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP) under the direction of Haowen Tong, this little cave has yielded an abundant Late Pleistocene mammalian faunal assemblage, a surprising absence of artifacts, and major portions of an early modern human skeleton. It is this human skeleton, 40,000 years old, that is of concern here. The Tianyuandong discovery has brought new attention to the paleoanthropological richness of the Zhoukoudian region, and it has occurred during a time when paleoanthropology has been focused on the earliest modern humans to spread across much of the Old World. In the past decade, the Niah Cave human fossil from Sarawak has been confirmed to be 40,000 years old. The field of paleoanthropology has seen the discovery of the oldest modern human remains in Europe, at the Peştera cu Oase in Romania, also 40,000 years old. It has seen the dating to the same time period of the Nazlet Khater skeletons from Egypt. And to this has been added the more recent South African Hofmeyr cranium, as well as direct ages confirming the antiquity of the Mladeč, Muierii, and Cioclovina early Preface x PREFACE modern humans in Europe. In this resurgence of interest in the biology of the earliest modern humans to spread across the Old World, the Tianyuandong human takes its place. The authors hope that this book, detailing many aspects of the morphology and paleobiology of this partial skeleton from northern China, will help integrate it into our assessments of human evolutionary history in eastern Asia and the processes that were involved in the global establishment of people anatomically similar to ourselves. This book is principally the fruit of our efforts to describe and analyze these fossil remains in light of current knowledge of Late Pleistocene human biology, with additional contributions by Yolanda Fernández-Jalvo and Peter Andrews on the burial taphonomy of the skeleton and by Yaowu Hu and Michael Richards on its stable isotopes. None of this would have been possible without the encouragement , assistance, support, and enthusiasm of a multitude of individuals. Our gratitude goes first and foremost to Haowen Tong, of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, for inviting HS to be part of the excavation team, turning the human remains over to her for analysis, and providing support and advice throughout the human paleontological aspects of the project . Without him and his generosity, none of this would have happened. We are also very grateful to Xinzhi Wu (IVPP) for overseeing the whole Tianyuandong project, recognizing its importance, providing continuous support to HS, and being a wonderful host to ET at the IVPP. We also appreciate the constant support of Wu Liu and Xing Gao in IVPP’s Department of Paleoanthropology during this project. During the excavation of Tianyuandong, several people provided invaluable assistance, including Xiumei Tian and her family of the Tianyuan Tree Farm, and Fuyou Chen and Shuangquan Zhang, both of the IVPP. The staff at the Site Museum at Zhoukoudian provided fieldwork assistance, lodging, and laboratory facilities during the excavations. Subsequently at the IVPP in Beijing, Zhongyi Zhao and Haijun Wang made the casts of the human remains; Wei Gao took many of the photographs and provided photographic assistance; and Wending Zhang took the radiographs of the Tianyuan human...