Earthquake Detector Invented 2,000 Years Ago In China
Although we still cannot accurately predict earthquakes, we have come a long way in detecting, recording, and measuring seismic shocks. Many don’t realize that this process began nearly 2,000 years ago, with the invention of the first seismoscope in 132 AD by a Chinese inventor called Zhang (‘Chang’) Heng.
The device was remarkably accurate in detecting earthquakes from afar and did not rely on shaking or movement in the location where the device was situated.
The ancient Chinese did not understand that earthquakes were caused by the shifting of tectonic plates in the Earth’s crust; instead, the people explained them as disturbances with cosmic yin and yang, along with the heavens’ displeasure with acts committed (or the common peoples’ grievances ignored) by the currently ruling dynasty.
Considering the ancient Chinese believed seismic events were important signs from heaven, it was important for the Chinese leaders to be alerted to earthquakes occurring anywhere in their kingdom.
Zhang Cheng was an astronomer, mathematician, engineer, geographer and inventor, who lived during the Han Dynasty (25 – 220 AD). He is credited with developing the world’s first earthquake detector. Zhang’s seismoscope was a giant bronze vessel, resembling a samovar almost 6 feet in diameter.
Eight dragons snaked face-down along the outside of the barrel, marking the primary compass directions. In each dragon’s mouth was a small bronze ball. Beneath the dragons sat eight bronze toads, with their broad mouths gaping to receive the balls.
The exact mechanism that caused a ball to drop in the event of an earthquake is still unknown. One theory is that a thin stick was set loosely down the centre of the barrel.
An earthquake would cause the stick to topple over in the direction of the seismic shock, triggering one of the dragons to open its mouth and release the bronze ball.
The sound of the ball striking one of the eight toads would alert observers to the earthquake and would give a rough indication of the earthquake’s direction of origin.
In 138 AD, the sound of the bronze ball dropping caused a stir among all the imperial officials in the palace. No one believed that the invention actually worked.
According to the direction in which the dragon that dropped the ball was oriented, it was determined that the quake had occurred to the west of Luoyang, the capital city. Since no one had sensed anything in Luoyang proper, people were sceptical.
However, a few days later, a messenger from the western Long region (today, southwest Gansu province), which was west of Luoyang, reported that there had been an earthquake there. As it happened exactly the same time that the seismometer was triggered, people were greatly impressed by Zhang Heng’s instrument.
In 2005, scientists in Zhengzhou, China (which was also Zhang’s hometown) managed to replicate Zhang’s seismoscope and used it to detect simulated earthquakes based on waves from four different real-life earthquakes in China and Vietnam.
The seismoscope detected all of them. As a matter of fact, the data gathered from the tests corresponded accurately with that gathered by modern-day seismometers!
Today, from an advanced modern science and technology point of view, the seismometer Zhang Heng invented is still considered amazingly refined and remarkable and way ahead of its time.
Oopart (out of place artefact) is a term applied to dozens of prehistoric objects found in various places around the world that seem to show a level of technological advancement incongruous with the times in which they were made.
Ooparts often frustrate conventional scientists, delight adventurous investigators open to alternative theories, and spark debate. In a mysterious pyramid in China’s Qinghai Province near Mount Baigong are three caves filled with pipes leading to a nearby salt-water lake. There are also pipes under the lake bed and on the shore.
The iron pipes range in size, with some smaller than a toothpick. The strangest part is that they may be about 150,000 years old.
Dating done by the Beijing Institute of Geology determined these iron pipes were smelted about 150,000 years ago, if they were indeed made by humans, according to Brian Dunning of Skeptoid.com.
And if they were made by humans, history, as it is commonly viewed, would have to be re-evaluated.
The dating was done using thermoluminescence, a technique that determines how long ago crystalline mineral was exposed to sunlight or heated. Humans are only thought to have inhabited the region for the past 30,000 years.
Even within the known history of the area, the only humans to inhabit the region were nomads whose lifestyle would not leave any such structures behind.
The state-run news agency Xinhua in China reported on the pyramid, the pipes, and the research began by a team of scientists sent to investigate in 2002.
Though some have since tried to explain the pipes as a natural phenomenon, Yang Ji, a research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told Xinhua the pyramid may have been built by intelligent beings.
He did not dismiss the theory that ancient extraterrestrials may be responsible, saying this theory is:
“understandable and worth looking into… but scientific means must be employed to prove whether or not it is true.”
Another theory is that it was built by prehistoric humans with techniques lost to humans of a later period.
The pipes lead into a salty lake, though a twin lake nearby contains freshwater. The surrounding landscape is strewn with what Xinhua described as “strangely shaped stones.” Rocks protrude from the ground like broken pillars.
The head of the publicity department at the local Delingha government told Xinhua the pipes were analyzed at a local smeltery and 8 per cent of the material could not be identified. The rest was made up of ferric oxide, silicon dioxide, and calcium oxide.
The silicon dioxide and calcium oxide are products of long interaction between the iron and surrounding sandstone, showing the ancient age of the pipes. Liu Shaolin, the engineer who did the analysis, told Xinhua:
“This result has made the site even more mysterious. Nature is harsh here,” he said. “There are no residents let alone modern industry in the area, only a few migrant herdsmen to the north of the mountain.”
To further add to the mystery, Zheng Jiandong, a geology research fellow from the China Earthquake Administration told the state-run newspaper People’s Daily in 2007 that some of the pipes were found to be highly radioactive.
Other Theories
Jiandong said iron-rich magma may have risen from deep in the Earth, bringing the iron into fissures where it would solidify into tubes. Though he admitted,
“There is indeed something mysterious about these pipes.”
He cited radioactivity as an example of the strange qualities of the pipes. Others have said iron sediments may have washed into the fissures, carried with water during floods.
Though Xinhua and other publications in China have referred to a pyramid or even a mysterious pyramid in which the pipes were found, some have said it was a pyramid-shaped natural formation. Another theory is that the pipes are fossilized tree roots. Xinmin Weekly reported in 2003 that scientists found plant matter in an analysis of the pipes, and they also found what looked like tree rings.
The article related the finding to a geological theory that in certain temperatures and under certain chemical conditions, tree roots can undergo diagenesis (transformation of soil into rock) and other processes that can produce iron formations.
Reports on the tree-root explanation for the so-called Baigong pipes often lead back to this Xinmin Weekly article or lack citation. It’s unclear exactly how well-supported this theory is in relation to the Baigong pipes.
An article published in the Journal of Sedimentary Research in 1993 describes fossilized tree roots in South Louisiana in the United States.
The Mysterious Man-Made Caves Of Longyou: 10 Unanswered Questions
Located near the village of Shiyan Beicun in Zhejiang province, China lies the Longyou caves – an extensive, magnificent and rare ancient underground world considered in China as ‘the ninth wonder of the ancient world’.
The Longyou grottoes, which are thought to date back at least 2,000 years, represent one of the largest underground excavations of ancient times and are an enduring mystery that has perplexed experts from every discipline that has examined them. Scientists from around the world in the fields of archaeology, architecture, engineering, and geology have absolutely no idea how they were built, by whom, and why. First discovered in 1992 by a local villager, 36 grottoes have now been discovered covering a massive 30,000 square metres. Carved into solid siltstone, each grotto descends around 30 metres underground and contains stone rooms, bridges, gutters and pools.
There are pillars evenly distributed throughout the caves which are supporting the ceiling, and the walls, ceiling and stone columns are uniformly decorated with chisel marks in a series of parallel lines. Only one of the caves has been opened for tourism, chosen because of the stone carvings found inside which depict a horse, fish and bird. The Longyou caves truly are an enigma and here we will explore ten mysteries that are still unexplained despite more than two decades of research.
1. How were they constructed?
A rough estimation of the workload involved in building these five caves is awe-inspiring. The quantity of rock that would have been removed in the overall excavation of the grottoes is estimated to be nearly 1,000,000 cubic meters. Taking into account the average digging rate per day per person, scientists have calculated that it would take 1,000 people working day and night for six years to complete. These calculations are based purely on hard labour, but what they haven’t taken into account is the incredible care and precision of the sculptors, meaning that the actual workload would far surpass the theoretical estimation. As for how they were constructed and what tools were used, it is still unknown. No tools have been found in the area, and, as we will explore later, scientists still don’t know how they achieved such symmetry, precision, and similarity between the different caves.
2. No traces of construction
Despite their size and the effort involved in creating them, so far no trace of their construction or even their existence has been located in the historic record. Although the overall excavation involved almost a million cubic metres of stone, there is no archaeological evidence revealing where that quantity of stone went, and no evidence of the work. Moreover, there is not a single historic document that refers to them, which is highly unusual considering the sheer scale of the project. Their origin is a complete and utter mystery.
3. Why were the walls chiselled?
Every single one of the caves is covered, from floor to ceiling, in parallel lines that have been chiselled into virtually every surface.
The effect is a uniform pattern throughout the caves, which would have required immense manpower and endless hours to create. The question is why? Was such labour-intensive work purely for decoration?
Are the lines or patterns symbolic in some way? All that is currently known is that the markings are similar to those found on pottery housed in a nearby museum, which is dated between 500 and 800 BC.
4. Lack of fish
When the caves were first discovered, they were filled with water, which presumably had been there for a long period of time. They had to be pumped out in order to realise that these were not just like the other ‘bottomless ponds’ found within the area, but man-made structures. Most villages in southern China contain very deep ponds, which have been called “bottomless ponds” by generations of villagers. These ponds teem with fish, which are easily caught. However, after the first cave was pumped dry, not a single fish was to be seen, or any other sign of life.
5. How did the caves remain so well preserved?
One of the most interesting and challenging questions is how the caves have been able to keep their structural integrity for more than 2000 years. There are no signs of collapse, no piles of rubble, and no damage despite the fact that in some areas the walls are only 50 centimetres thick. Over the centuries, the area has gone through numerous floods, calamities and wars, the mountains have changed their appearance and exposed stones have been weathered, but inside the caves, the form, patterns and markings are still clear and precise – it is as though they were built yesterday.
6. How did the builders work in the dark?
Due to the great depths of the caves, some areas at the bottom, which are not exposed to the opening above, are pitch-black. Yet even those dark areas are decorated with thousands of parallel lines on the walls, columns, and ceiling. So how did the ancient people work in the dark?
According to Jia Gang, a Tongji University professor specializing in civil engineering:
“There should be lamps, because the cave’s mouth is very small, and the sunbeam could only shine in the cave at a certain angle during a certain period of time. As one goes deeper into the cave, the light becomes dimmer. At the cave’s bottom, which is usually dozen of meters from the mouth, one could hardly see anything.”
However, this was at least two millennia ago and nothing that could have been used for lighting has been found.
7. Were the caves meant to be connected?
All of the 36 grottoes are distributed across an area of only one square kilometre. Considering such a high density, one cannot help asking whether some grottoes were meant to be connected. What would be the purpose of making so many separate caves in such a tight area without connecting them?
In many areas, the walls between the caves are very thin, only 50 centimetres, but they were never linked so it appears they were intentionally kept apart. What’s more, many of the caves are almost identical to each other.
8. Who built them?
Nobody has any idea who built the caves. Some scientists have claimed that it was not possible or logical for such as mammoth job to have been undertaken by regular village people.
Only the emperor and the leaders could have organised such a huge project, like the construction of the Great Wall, which was built to defend against invasion from the outside. But if it was commissioned by an Emperor, why are there no historical records of its construction?
9. How did they achieve such precision?
The scale of the Longyou Grottoes is magnificent and momentous, the design was delicate and scientific, the construction was sophisticated, and the precision is indicative of superior craftsmanship. The model, pattern and style of each cave are extremely similar. Every grotto is like a grand hall. One side is steep and another side is 45% inclined. The four walls are straight; the edges and corners are clearly demarcated. The chiselling marks are uniform and precise. According to Yang Hongxun, an expert at the Archaeological Institute of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences,
“At the bottom of each cave, the ancient [builders] wouldn’t be able to see what the others were doing in the next grotto. But the inside of each cave had to be parallel with that of the other, or else the wall would be holed through. Thus the measuring apparatus should have been very advanced. There must have been some layout about the sizes, locations, and the distances between the caves beforehand.”
With the help of modern equipment and methods, the investigators measured the sizes of the walls and surprisingly found that the overall construction is extremely accurate. The walls between the caves are of the same thickness in different sections. So how did they achieve this precision? What were their methods?
10. What were they used for?
Following extensive investigations and study, scientists and scholars have attempted to put forward explanations for the grottoes, but none so far provide a convincing explanation for why they were built and what they were used for. Some archaeologists have suggested that the grottoes were the tombs of old emperors, emperor halls, or places for storage. But this interpretation is far-fetched. No funeral objects or tombs have been found and no artefacts left behind. If it were used like an emperor’s palace, the grottoes would have been designed differently with separate rooms for different purposes like entertaining, meeting, and sleeping, but no evidence can be found of this and no traces of habitation have been found.
Another hypothesis is that it was used for mining and extracting some type of mineral resource. However, mining operations would have required equipment and apparatus to extract the rocks and transport them. Again, no traces of this have been found, nor any evidence of where the rocks were taken. And of course, if the caves were just for mining, why create such intricate decorations on the walls, columns and ceilings?
Finally, some have suggested that the grottoes were the places for troops to be stationed and that an emperor of the past wanted to keep his soldiers out of view in order to keep his war preparations secret. However, these caves could not have been built in a short period of time. They would have taken many, many years to build so it is unlikely to have been done in preparation for war, which tends to come about much more quickly. Furthermore, there are no signs of people having stayed in the caves. Despite decades of research, very few answers have emerged to explain the enigma of the Longyou caves. Our ancient ancestors have achieved many wondrous things, but this truly is an unexplained mystery.
A perfectly preserved 700-year-old mummy in brown liquid looked only a few months old
The skin of a mummy discovered by accident had been perfectly preserved for over 700 years. Road workers stumbled upon a jaw-dropping corpse belonging to a high-ranking woman from China’s Ming Dynasty.
An extremely well-preserved female corpse was found on March 1, 2011
News of the remarkable archaeological breakthrough on in the city of Taizhou, in eastern China on March 1 2011 was first broken to the world’s press a decade ago.
A team expanding a street in the Jiangsu Province dug up by chance two wooden tombs believed to date back to China’s ruling power between 1368 and 1644.
Just six-and-a-half feet below the road surface was the woman whose features shoes and ring all remained intact and showed hardly any signs of deterioration.
A ring survived 700 years on the woman’s finger
Chinese archaeologists were immediately called from the nearby Museum of Taizhou to inspect the body and were stunned by the condition of almost everything from the woman’s skin and hair right down to her eyelashes.
Experts claimed it was as though the diminutive 4’9 woman found swamped in a mysterious brown liquid, had only died recently.
Taizhou was reportedly buzzing off the discovery which included a ring still fixed on a finger belonging to the long-dead woman.
Researchers said what she was clothed in on her death married up with the traditional costume of the Ming dynasty, as did various ceramics, ancient writings and other relics inside her coffin.
The coffin contained a mysterious brown liquid
Oddly bones which did not belong to the corpse were also buried with her.
It was the first discovery of a mummy in the region in three years and the sixth since 1979.
Previous findings sparked an interest in learning how corpses remained so well preserved from the Ming Dynasty and what rituals were involved in the mummification process.
Director of the Museum of Taizhou, Wang Weiyin, explained mummy tended to be clad in silk and a little cotton but both are difficult to keep in a good condition.
Excavations found that achieving such brilliant corpse preservation required technology used exclusively at very high-profile funerals.
Archaeologists from the Museum of Taizhou responded to the accidental discovery
5,200-year-old stone carving chrysalis found in north China
According to the provincial archaeological research institute, archaeologists discovered a stone-carved silkworm chrysalis dating back at least 5,200 years in north China’s Shanxi Province last month.
The stone-carved chrysalis was discovered in a semi-crypt house at the Shangguo Site in Wenxi County, near the city of Yuncheng. It measures 2.8 cm long, with a maximum abdominal diameter of 1.2 cm.
Archaeologists surmised that this home dates to the early stage of the late Yangshao Culture era, some 5,200 years ago, based on pottery fragments that have been discovered.
The Yangshao culture was a Neolithic culture that existed extensively along the middle reaches of the Yellow River in China from around 5000 BC to 3000 BC.
This culture is famous for its red-painted pottery, one of the two main types produced in the neolithic period in China, and before 2000 BC Yangshao was making spiral red earthenware pots fired in ovens at 1000°C-1500°C.
A model of Jiangzhai, a Yangshao village.
Yangshao artisans created fine white, red, and black painted pottery with human facial, animal, and geometric designs, and they did not use pottery wheels in pottery-making.
China News Service, Taiyuan, July 16 (Yang Peipei and Hu Jian) The Wenxi Shangguo site in Shanxi released the latest archaeological results on the 16th. The site unearthed the Yangshao period and pottery models in the early Spring and Autumn Period.
The excavation further confirmed that the Shangguo site has two main periods, namely the middle and late Yangshao period and the late Western Zhou period to the Spring and Autumn period.
The excavation site in 2022 is selected to be adjacent to the west and north of the exploration in 2021. The excavation covers an area of 500 square meters.
Various relics have been found, including 2 ash ditch, 56 ash pits (including 7 house sites in the Yangshao era), 2 stove sites, 1044 pottery models, 183 pottery ware, 14 jade ware, 157 stone tools, 123 bone tools, 4 small copperware, 7 copper slag, 46 shellfish, 2 ironware, 4 egg shells, and 1 fruit stone unearthed. 1585 pieces.
Large water vessel of the late Yangshao culture; from Shaanxi, Shanxi or Gansu province; 4th millennium BC; Rietberg Museum (Zürich, Switzerland)
Among them, H50 is bag-shaped. Judging from the pottery pieces such as the red pottery and sand pots with piled patterns on the outside of the unearthed mouth, the white-robed pottery bowls, and the basket-shaped pointed bottom bottle belly pieces, they belong to the early stage of the late Yangshao period, about 5,200 years ago.
The pit is divided into four layers, and a stone-carved silkworm chrysalis was unearthed in the first layer.
Over the past 100 years, relics related to the silkworm culture have been unearthed in many places in Yuncheng City, said Tian Jianwen, a researcher with the provincial archaeology research institute.
“At present, many silkworm cocoons and chrysalises discovered in Yuncheng City have been found in good condition, indicating that the ancestors of Yangshao Culture in southern Shanxi had raised silkworms,” said Tian. The discovery of stone carving chrysalises provided important clues for the study of the origin and spread of silk, according to Tian.
300-Million-Year-Old Screw Embedded Into Rock Discovered In China
The Lanzhou screw is another mysterious object discovered in recent years that seems to challenge mainstream archaeology and history. It was discovered in 2002 and has since generated a great amount of attention among collectors and researchers.
The most mysterious part of this object is that, within the piece of rock, a metal screw was discovered. The mysterious pear-shaped stone is about 6×8 cm and weighs around 466 grams.
But it is not a common rock and the metal-shaped screw just adds to the mystery of the rock that according to researchers is around 300 million years old. As a matter of fact, the mysterious black rock has geologists scratching their heads.
According to reports from Chinese News agencies, a mysterious object discovered in 2002 could be evidence of prehistorical civilizations.
The Lanzhou screw is believed to be similar to the one found in Russia in the 90s.
These objects challenge mainstream archaeology and history
Researchers from numerous Chinese laboratories have studied the item
Tests have failed to show the exact composition of the mysterious rock, researchers include geologists and physicists from the National Land Resources Bureau of Gansu Province, Colored Metal Survey Bureau of Gansu Province, the Institute of Geology and Minerals
Research of China Academy, Lanzhou Branch, and the School of Resources and Environment of Lanzhou College, are unsure of the origin of the artefact and point out that at this time, all theories are possible.
According to Lanzhou Morning News; After a discussion about the possibility of being man-made and the possible reasons for its formation, scientists unanimously labelled the stone as one of the most valuable in China and in the world of collection, research and Archeological studies.”
Numerous theories have been proposed that try to explain the origin of the mysterious rock and the embedded 6 cm cone-shaped metal bar which bears clear screw threads.
While most researchers firmly believe this artefact to be the remains of a prehistoric civilization, other researchers suggest that, given the mysterious composition of certain elements of the rock, there is a possibility that both the rock and mysterious metal screw could have originated on another planet.
After numerous studies, Chinese scientists concluded that the artefact had not been made by contemporary hands or by current technology levels, the most accepted hypothesis is that it is a product of a prehistoric civilization.
Despite various opinions, researchers have not been able to confirm if the screw was forged from a metallic material or from some other material.
Researchers from the Institute of Geology and Minerals Research of China Academy suggest that the mysterious body of the Lanzhou screw was made before the rock that contains it solidified, a process that is believed to have taken place 300 million years before the present era.
It is most likely that there is something missing in the distant history of mankind. History and archaeology clearly do not reflect the entire picture of our past and objects like the Lanzhou screw are proof of it.
According to researchers, 300 million years ago, the supercontinent Pangea formed. It is during that time that the Lanzhou screw was believed to have been created, curiously, the Lanzhou screw has a similar history to the screw discovered in Russia in the 90’s.
The Russian screw, also embedded into rock, was found by chance as researchers were performing analysis after the fall of a meteorite in the Kaluga region when they came across a mysterious object that resembled a modern-day screw.
Tests performed on the mysterious rock from Russia demonstrated that there are several screws embedded into the structure. Curiously, the age of the Russian screw is believed to be an exact match to the one found in China.
Discoveries like this are anything but uncommon as this object belongs to a list of other out-of-place artefacts that have been discovered in the last tweet years.
All of these discoveries point toward the possibility that our history and origins have been completely wrong. It is quite likely that millions of years ago, the Earth was completely different home to a species much different to ours today. Objects like the ones found in China and Russia point toward the possibility that advanced civilizations might have existed millions of years ago on our planet.
Mainstream Archaeology and history will continue to deny these findings since they are capable of rewriting history and our origins as we know it.
Do you think it’s possible that artefacts like the ones found in Russia and China are the remains of prehistorical advanced civilizations?
Changing the way we look at our past and history might help us understand what the true meaning of these artefacts is.
1200-Year-Old Tibetan Chessboard Found Engraved On Rock
The Tubo Kingdom of Tibet flourished from circa the 7th – 9th centuries. Interestingly enough, the ancient land-locked realm was influenced by both contemporary Chinese and Indians, especially in the fields of government, religion, literature, and culture.
Pertaining to the latter, archaeologists have discovered a Tibetan chessboard engraved on an imposing rock surface dating back to the Tubo era.
The discovery was made in what is now southwest China’s Sichuan province, with the site being located only around 19 miles away from the autonomous region of Garze in Tibet.
According to the researchers from the cultural and tourism bureau of the Tibetan autonomous region, the chessboard was carved on the surface of a 2-tonne rock, thus essentially making it the centrepiece of the massive ‘setup’.
However, since we are talking about chess, the board arrangement varies from our modern chessboard, with the 1,300-year-old specimen having 100 squares instead of 64.
Furthermore, the researchers also found two grooves on either side of the engraved board that was probably used for holding the pieces.
Now in terms of history, the Tubo Kingdom was multi-ethnic in nature, while also being one of the most powerful realms of Eastern Asia that established its dominance outside of traditional Tibet – mainly in the regions of what is now modern Gansu and Qinghai.
As for the cultural side of affairs, this ancient version of chess was pretty popular among the Tibetan noble classes, with the game often played by the commanders of the realm.
Relating to this scope, Chinese archaeologists had previously discovered a similar Tibetan chessboard in Maizhokunggar county within Tibet proper.
Scientists at the Centro Nacional de Investigación Sobre la Evolución Humana (CENIEH) form part of a team of Chinese, Spanish, and French scientists that has just published a study of what may prove to be China’s most ancient human fossil, in the Journal of Human Evolution.
Remains of jawbone and teeth of Gongwangling skull/Xing Song
The researchers employed microCT, geometric morphometry, and classical morphology techniques to investigate the remains of the maxillary and five teeth from the skull unearthed at the Chinese site of Gongwangling.
This site is on the vast plains on the northern slopes of the Quinling Mountains (province of Shaanxi, in central China) and was discovered by the scientist Woo Ju-Kang in 1963.
The age of the site was reevaluated in 2015 through regional palaeomagnetism studies.
Those data suggest that the Gongwangling remains date from something over 1.6 million years ago, and so they could belong to one of the first human beings to colonize what is now China.
According to the new study, there exist similarities between the Gongwangling teeth and those from rather more recent Chinese sites: Meipu and Quyuan River Mouth; but some variability is also presented, suggesting a certain diversity among the populations of H. Erectus that colonized Asia during the Pleistocene.
The importance of this new work lies in the scarcity of information about the early colonisation of Asia.
The Dmanisi site (Republic of Georgia) has furnished very significant evidence of the earliest inhabitants of Asia, who arrived from Africa around two million years ago. But much more information is needed to connect Dmanisi with the classic H. erectus populations of China (Hexian, Yiyuan, Xichuan, or Zhoukoudian), who lived in this great continental mass between 400,000 and 800,000 years ago.
“The Gongwangling site helps to plug this enormous lapse of time and it suggests that Asia might have been settled by successive populations of the species H. Erectus at different moments of the Pleistocene”, comments José María Bermúdez de Castro, coordinator of the Paleobiology Program at the CENIEH.
Characteristics of Homo erectus
The Gongwangling skull presents all the characteristics described for H. Erectus: low and very long cranium, with very thick bones that protected a brain of some 780 cubic centimetres; steeply inclined frontal, with pronounced superciliary arches that form a sort of twin visor above the eyes; flattened parietals which rise at the top to produce a sagittal keel; maximum parietal thickness at the skull base.
The Gongwangling occipital is incomplete, but the reconstruction shows how this bone turns abruptly to comprise the skull base.
Close collaboration between Chinese scientists, led by Liu Wu, of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP), and the Spanish scientists at the CENIEH who, in alphabetical order, were Bermúdez de Castro, Laura Martín-Francés, and María Martinón-Torres, has been essential to this new study of the fossil teeth from China.
