AUSTRALOPITHECINES — ROBINSON 491 



Paranthropus type (Leakey, 1961a and 1961b). This I can confirm 

 after having exammed the originals through the kind courtesy of 

 Dr. and Mrs. Leakey. In the opinion of Leakey, it is also not of 

 Australopithecus type, but to me it appears to bear very close re- 

 semblance to the latter. The tvro parietal bones are of considerable 

 interest in that they appear to be too large for either Paranthropus 

 or Australopithecus. If this is in fact the case, then the implication 

 is that a hominid with a larger braincase than that of either form 

 of australopithecine was present at the site. If the parietals and 

 the mandible belong to the same type of creature, then this would be 

 a form closely related to Australopithecus. It has long been my opin- 

 ion (e.g., Robinson, 1956, p. 171) that "Telanthropus" is a more 

 advanced descendant of an earlier level of Australopithecvs than that 

 at present laiowii. Therefore an early Austral opithecu8-\\kQ> form 

 with a relativel}^ large brain could easily represent an early form of 

 "Telanthropus" — on the new K-A dating of Olduvai (Leakey, Evern- 

 den, and Curtis, 1961) the Bed I form would appear to be approxi- 

 mately half a million years earlier than "Telanthropus" from the 

 Sterkfontein Valley. However, these are very tentative ideas which 

 must await confirmation of {a) the presence of a relatively large- 

 brained hominid in the lower levels of Bed I, and {h) the fact that 

 the creature represented by the parietals and that by the mandible 

 are the same. A stone industry is present with these specimens, and 

 this has led Leakey (1961b) to entertain the possibility that it, as well 

 as the whole Oldowan industiy of Bed I, were made by this form, 

 including also the industry associated with "Zinjanthropus." It is 

 manifest that these tentative conclusions emerging from the newer 

 finds at Olduvai are strictly consistent with the conclusions reached 

 above from the Sterkfontein finds. 



If either of the australopithecines was to be a toolmaker, it is far 

 more likely to have been Australopithecus. If it was not, as the 

 Sterkfontein evidence seems to indicate, then it is very improbable 

 that the vegetarian Paranthropus would be. Australopithecines, it 

 will also be recalled, had brains well within the pongid size range. 

 Finally, a characteristic feature of the earlier levels of the stone age 

 culture sequence is the exasperating fact that remains of the makers of 

 the tools are so exceedingly rare. Wliy then, if the australopithecines 

 were toolmakers, should their remains be so common and stone tools 

 rare when the normal experience is exactly the reverse? This seems 

 a further argument against any of the australopithecines being tool- 

 makers. "Telanthropus" remains, on the other hand, are very rare. 



I submit, therefore, that there is no good evidence in support of 

 the thesis that australopithecines were stone-tool makers but that 

 there is very pertinent evidence agauist it, favoring the idea that this 



