HUMAN HISTORY 113 



Pithecanthropus was found belonged to the PHocene. Very great 

 interest naturally attaches to this question ; Dubois's view has 

 been challenged ; subsequent visitors to Trinil have very 

 cai;efully considered the matter, and the weight of scientific 

 opinion now favours the attribution of the strata to the early 

 Pleistocene.^ 



The scantiness of the remains renders a reconstruction of the 

 individual a difficult and doubtful matter. Nevertheless, after 

 some twenty years of discussion there is a very general agreement 

 that Pithecanthropus was in many respects intermediate in type 

 between modern man and the hypothetical pre-human ancestor. 

 The bones of the cranium are fused, the brow ridges massive, 

 and there is a marked narrowing behind the orbit — all ape-like 

 features. Further the cranium is flattened somewhat as among 

 the apes, but not to so great a degree ; the altitudinal index is 

 34-2 ; of the average European it is 52 ; of Neanderthal man 

 40-4. The cranial capacity is about 855 c.c, or 250 c.c. greater 

 than the largest known skull of any of the Simiidae, whereas the 

 average cranial capacity of the Australian, the lowest living race, 

 is about 1190 c.c. The femur has only a slight curvature, and is 

 decidedly human, indicating that its possessor was some 1650- 

 1700 mm. in height, and probably walked upright. The teeth 

 are simian rather than human, the roots diverge and the crowns 

 are large ; they exhibit, nevertheless, certain human features. 



If we attempt to reconstruct Pithecanthropus, we must picture 

 a creature half ape, half man, which was probably terrestrial and 

 erect. His body weight must have been about 70 kilograms. If 

 this fact is correct, it provides a very useful method of estimating 

 the relation of Pithecanthropus to the apes on one hand and to 

 man on the other. We know roughly what proportion brain 

 weight bears to body weight. If Pithecanthropus had been 

 human — given the brain weight deduced from the cranial capacity 

 — the body weight should be 19 kilograms. If Pithecanthropus 

 had been simian, the body weight should be 230 kilograms. We 

 have in fact reason to think that it was about 70 kilograms. 



The skull and the femur were not found together but some fifty feet apart. The 

 attribution of all the remains to one individual is, however, probably justified. 



1 Elbert (Cent, fiir Mm., Geol. und Pal, Bd. 17, 1909, p. 513) holds that the 

 beds are on the border between the Pliocene and the Pleistocene. Volz {Neves 

 Jahr. fiir Min., Geol. und Pal. ; Festband zur Feier des 100-jdhrigen Bestehens, 1907, 

 p. 256) places the beds in the Middle Pleistocene. The whole problem is discussed 

 by Selenka and Blanckenhorn. See Die Pithecanthro'pus-Schichten auf .Java. 



2498 XT 



