Peking Man (Homo erectus pekinensis, originally "Sinanthropus pekinensis") is a subspecies of H. erectus which inhabited what is now northern China during the Middle Pleistocene. Its fossils have been found in a cave some southwest of Beijing (referred to in the West as Peking upon its first discovery), known as the Zhoukoudian Peking Man Site. The first fossil, a tooth, was discovered in 1921, and Zhoukoudian has since become the most productive H. erectus site in the world. Peking Man was instrumental in the foundation of Chinese anthropology, and fostered an important dialogue between Western and Eastern science. Peking Man became the centre of anthropological discussion, and was classified as a direct human ancestor, propping up the Out of Asia theory that humans evolved in Asia.
Peking Man also played a vital role in the restructuring of Chinese identity following the Chinese Communist Revolution, and it was used to introduce the general populace to Marxism and science. Early models of Peking Man society were compared to communist or nationalist ideals, leading to discussions on primitive communism and polygenism (that Peking Man was the direct ancestor of Chinese people). This produced a strong schism between Western and Eastern interpretations of the origin of modern humans, especially as the West adopted the Out of Africa theory in the late 20th century, which described Peking Man as an offshoot in human evolution. Though Out of Africa is now the consensus, Peking Man interbreeding with human ancestors is still discussed.
Peking Man characterises the classic H. erectus anatomy. The skull is long and heavily fortified, featuring an inflated bar of bone circumscribing the crown, crossing along the brow ridge, over the ears, and connecting at the back of the skull; as well as a sagittal keel running across the midline. The bone of the skull and the long bones is extremely thickened. The face is protrusive (midfacial prognathism), the eye sockets are wide, the jaws are robust and chinless, the teeth are large, and the incisors are shovel-shaped. Brain volume ranged from , for an average of just over —within the range of variation for modern humans. The limbs are broadly anatomically comparable to those of modern humans. H. erectus in such northerly latitudes may have averaged roughly in height, compared to for more tropical populations.
Peking Man lived in a cool, predominantly steppe, partially forested environment, alongside deer, rhinos, elephants, bison, buffalo, bears, wolves, big cats, and other animals. Peking Man fossils appear intermittently in Zhoukoudian deposits dating as far back as 800,000 years ago to as recently as 230,000 years ago, but the precise chronology is unclear. This spans several cold glacial and warm interglacial periods. The cultural complexity of Peking Man is fiercely debated. If Peking Man was capable of hunting (as opposed to predominantly scavenging), making clothes, and controlling fire, the population would have been well-equipped to survive frigid glacial periods. If not, the population would have had to retreat southward and return later. It is further disputed if Peking Man inhabited the cave, or was killed by giant hyenas (Pachycrocuta) and dumped there. Over 100,000 pieces of stone tools have been recovered from Zhoukoudian. Those pieces have been mainly debitage (wastage), but also include many simple choppers and flakes, and a few retouched tools such as scrapers and possibly burins.
Taxonomy Research history Discovery
To aid the China Geological Survey's efforts to map out economically relevant deposits, the Geological Survey of Sweden sent the Swedish economic geologist Johan Gunnar Andersson to China in 1914. Andersson soon also began collecting archaeological finds and "dragon bones", as well as documenting Chinese mythology. In 1918, while in Beijing (then referred to in the West as Peking), he was pointed towards a potentially interesting fossil deposit in the mining town of Zhoukoudian in the Fangshan District, about southwest, by the American chemistry teacher John McGregor Gibb. When Andersson visited a month later, he was directed towards an old limestone quarry which the locals called Chi Ku Shan ('Chicken Bone Hill'). They believed the many rodent fossils found there belonged to chickens stolen by a malevolent group of foxes that had turned into evil trickster spirits and drove a man insane.
Andersson left China to work on other projects, but returned in 1921 with the prominent American palaeontologist Walter W. Granger and the Austrian palaeontologist Otto Zdansky, a recent graduate of the Palaeontological Museum of Uppsala University. Andersson decided that the Chi Ku Shan locality would be an excellent training ground for Zdansky before the pair moved on to excavating Hipparion (horse) fossils in Henan. They were advised by a local that more interesting "dragon bones" could be found at a nearby fissure in a limestone cliff, later named Longgushan ('Dragon Bone Hill') locality. That same year, Zdansky found the first fossil (specimen PMU M3550)—a human tooth—in the site, but he did not report it to Andersson. While studying the Zhoukoudian material in Uppsala, Zdansky identified another human tooth, and reported his find (which he cautiously labelled as Homo sp.?) to his professor and mentor Carl Wiman, who informed Andersson in 1926.
As part of his world tour, the crown prince of Sweden (and the chairman of the Swedish China Research Committee, Andersson's benefactor) Gustaf VI Adolf visited Beijing on 22 October 1926. At a meeting planned for the prince, Andersson presented lantern slides of Zdansky's fossil teeth. He was able to convince his friend, the Canadian palaeanthropologist Davidson Black (who worked for the Peking Union Medical College, which was funded by the Rockefeller Foundation), the Chinese geologist Weng Wenhao (the head of the China Geological Survey), and the prominent French palaeoanthropologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin to jointly take over study of Zhoukoudian. Andersson returned to Sweden to become the founding director of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, Stockholm. In the press coverage immediately after the meeting, the German-American geologist Amadeus William Grabau for the first time publicly used the phrase "Peking Man" to refer to Zdansky's fossil teeth.
In 1927, Black was preoccupied with his duties to the college, so Andersson and Wiman sent one of Wiman's students, Anders Birger Bohlin, to oversee excavation beginning on 16 April. On 16 October, Bohlin extracted another fossil human tooth (specimen K11337), which Black made the holotype of a new genus and species called Sinanthropus pekinensis a few weeks later, accrediting the authority to both himself and Zdansky. This was the first anthropologically relevant find for nearly a year, and Teilhard questioned whether Peking Man was actually a human or some animal carnivore. According to the biological anthropologist Noel T. Boaz and the palaeoanthropologist Russell Ciochon, Black's decision to so quickly name a new genus may have been politically motivated—to secure further funding of the site. That year, Weng drafted an agreement with all Zhoukoudian scientists at the time that the Zhoukoudian remains would remain in China. In 1928, the Chinese government similarly clamped down on the exportation of Chinese artefacts and other archaeologically relevant materials to the West for study, viewing it as archaeological looting; foreign scientists were instead encouraged to research these materials within China. In 1929, Black persuaded the Peking Union Medical College, the China Geological Survey, and the Rockefeller Foundation to found and fund the Cenozoic Research Laboratory and ensure further study of Zhoukoudian.
On 2 December 1929, the Chinese anthropologist Pei Wenzhong discovered a fairly complete skullcap. Zhoukoudian proved to be a valuable archaeological site, with a preponderance of human fossils, stone tools, and potential evidence of early fire use, becoming the most productive Homo erectus site in the world. An additional four rather complete skullcaps were discovered by 1936, three of which were unearthed over an 11-day period in November 1936, overseen by the Chinese palaeoanthropologist Jia Lanpo. Excavation employed from 10 to over 100 local labourers depending on the stage, who were paid five or six jiao per day, in contrast to local coal miners who received a pittance of 40 to 50 yuan annually. According to the historian Sigrid Schmalzer, Zhoukoudian employed some of the biggest names in Western and Chinese geology, palaeontology, palaeoanthropology, and archaeology, and facilitated an important discourse and collaboration between these two civilisations. After Black's sudden death in 1934 from his congenital heart defect, the Jewish German anatomist Franz Weidenreich, who had fled Nazi Germany, was selected by the Rockefeller Foundation to continue Black's work.
Loss of specimens Excavation of Zhoukoudian began to stall after the Marco Polo Bridge incident on 7 July 1937 and the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War. Weidenreich had two crates made to store the Peking Man fossils, and transferred them from the Peking Union Medical College to an American bank vault to safeguard them from Imperial Japanese forces. They were soon returned to the college and stored in a safe in Weidenreich's office, where Weidenreich worked with technicians and artists to make plaster casts and detailed illustrations for his monograph describing the fossils. As the war progressed, Weng and Weidenreich unsuccessfully tried to convince the head of the college, Henry S. Houghton, to authorise a transfer of the Peking Man fossils to the United States for safekeeping. Houghton dismissed Weidenreich in 1941, who took the casts and research notes with him to the American Museum of Natural History in New York City with funding from the Rockefeller Foundation.
By September 1941, Weng and the president of the Rockefeller Foundation Raymond B. Fosdick had persuaded the U.S. embassy to authorise the transfer of the Peking Man fossils. Representing at least 40 different individuals, the fossils were put into two wooden footlockers and were to be transported by the United States Marine Corps from the Peking Union Medical College to the SS President Harrison which was to dock at Qinhuangdao Port (near the Marine base camp Camp Holcomb), and eventually arrive at the American Museum of Natural History. En route to Qinhuangdao, the ship was attacked by Japanese warships and ran aground. Though there have been many attempts to locate the footlockers—including by offers of large cash rewards—it is unknown what happened to them after they left the college on 4 December 1941.
Rumours about the fate of the fossils range from being on board a sunken ship (such as the Japanese Awa Maru) to being ground up for traditional Chinese medicine. The affair also provoked allegations of robbery against Japanese and American groups, especially during the Resist America, Aid Korea Campaign in 1950 and 1951 to promote anti-American sentiment during the Korean War. U.S. Marine corporal Richard Bowen recalled finding a box filled with bones one night in 1947 while digging a foxhole next to some stone barracks in Qinhuangdao. This happened during the Chinese Civil War, during a siege of the city by the Communist Eighth Route Army, who were under fire from Nationalist gunboats. According to Wang Qingpu, the author of a report for the Chinese government on the history of the port, if Bowen's story is accurate, the most probable location of the fossils is , underneath roads, a warehouse, or a parking lot.