Exhibition of Skull/Facial Reconstruction of some of Man's Earliest Ancestors

Here is news of an exhibition at the Senckenberg Natural History Museum in Frankfurt, Germany.

It features facial / skull reconstructions of some of Man's earliest ancestors:

www.dailymail.co.uk...

This is a reconstruction from the remains of a young woman, found in a cave in Israel, who lived 100,000-90,000 years ago:


This is a reconstruction from the remains of an adult male, found in Java Indonesia, who lived about 800,000 years ago:
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/a82f4d1a0bb6.jpg[/atsimg]

The exhibition goes back seven million years to sahelanthropus tchadensis and traces the numerous stages of man culminating with modern-day homo sapiens.
Each of the heads is used to tell its story: where they lived; what they ate; and what killed them.
It shows how researchers today use satellite image analysis and computer tomography.
There is little doubt that Africa is the cradle of humanity and this is where the most ancient of the remains were unearthed. But clues to other pre-human species have been found in the Middle East and Far East.
Only a few thousand fossils of pre-human species have ever been discovered and entire sub-species are sometimes known only from a single jaw or fragmentary skull.

The article includes 12 pictures altogether.

[edit on 24-3-2010 by berenike]

Here is information on Sahelanthropus Tchadensis, one of the persons featured in the exhibition:

www.wsu.edu...

Discovered in 2001 by a joint French-Chadian expedition in Chad led by Michel Brunet, this find was a surprise in many ways. This is one of the few early hominids found in central Africa rather than in the eastern and southern portions of the continent, and it is by far the oldest. Previously, it was thought that the Rift Valley of east Africa was a geographical boundary line between apes, who developed in the forests west of the line, and hominids, who were thought to have emerged in the drier eastern portion of Africa.

Toumai is approximately a million years older than the next oldest known hominid, dating to approximately seven million years in age. It should be noted that dating of remains in this part of Africa cannot be obtained by radiometric means, and instead is based on comparison of assemblages of fossils in east Africa, where absolute dates have been established. The comparisons provide reasonably certain dates.

This species was originally represented only by partial and fragmentary remains, including a single, mostly complete skull. Other fragmentary remains of this species, mostly teeth and jaws, have been found since, representing at least six and perhaps as many as nine individuals.

Part of the excitement about this find is that, given its age, this creature must have lived near the time of the presumed divergence of hominid from chimpanzee lines. In fact, estimates based on the “molecular clock” placed the divergence at somewhere between five and seven million years ago [the earliest estimates were 3 million years ago). The discovery of Orrorin tugenensis (see below) in the year 2000 had already pushed estimates back toward the earlier date.

Here is a skull:
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/1c9ad15bc706.jpg[/atsimg]

And here is a reconstruction, featured in the Daily Mail article:
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/038167b9149c.jpg[/atsimg]

(I don't know if it was this particular skull that the reconstruction was made from).


[edit on 24-3-2010 by berenike]

Here is some information on 'Mrs Ples' another individual featured in the exhibition:

www.ambafrance-rsa.org...

Mrs Ples - who might have been an adolescent male - is a distant relative of all humankind. Australopithecus africanus became extinct between 2.1 and 2.2 million years ago, and Mrs Ples is the last recorded occurrence of the species.
At the opening of the exhibition Prof Yves Coppens, honorary patron of the exhibition and co-discoverer of Lucy, a three million year-old Australopithecus afarensis fossil discovered in 1974, said: "Thanks to the Taung Child, the first fossil specimen to represent Australopithecus, and Mrs Ples, we know that pre-humanity has been African and only African. Humanity has a uniquely African origin."

Skull together with reconstruction featured in the above article:
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/cd339a2bc939.jpg[/atsimg]

Here is the reconstruction on display at the Senckenberg Natural History Museum (as shown in the Daily Mail article):
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/2f130343796d.jpg[/atsimg]

[edit on 24-3-2010 by berenike]

I doubt darwin was wrong about the apes to men

Here is some more information on homo rudolfensis, another of the exhibits:

www.archaeologyinfo.com...

The species designation of Homo rudolfensis is a much debated topic, over both whether it is a separate species, and if it is an australopithecine rather than a member of the genus Homo. The type specimen of the species is KNM-ER 1470. This specimen was discovered by Richard Leakey's team in 1972, east of Lake Turkana at Koobi Fora in northern Kenya. This discovery was of a fairly complete cranium without any remaining teeth. Due to uncertainties created by its large brain size and its early initial dates, Leakey did not attribute the specimen to a species, but simply as a member of the genus Homo.

Picture of skull taken from the above article:
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/f60da3d9602e.jpg[/atsimg]

Reconstruction taken from the Daily Mail article:
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/7e749aaa5591.jpg[/atsimg]


GW8UK Not my side of the family



[edit on 24-3-2010 by berenike]

I doubt Darwins theory, even he had that much sense. Why argue about it
though, we all die. So we will all find out Gods truth in the end.
Good thread.

Someday we all solve the great mystery. I look forward to it. With a kind of melancholy anticipation of a great adventure on the other side.
I always wonder what atheists look forward to.
[edit on 24-3-2010 by randyvs]

[edit on 24-3-2010 by randyvs]

I have a feeling that something just isn't right about the theory of evolution in regarding human from ape. I don't have any real data to support this, something just doesn't fit. It seems like this is another area of science that just has way too many questions and very few answers. I believe we have tried to come too far too fast. I don't think we really know for sure and are trying to hard to accept an explanation. It is normal for all of us to want to know where we come from. For all we know these skulls and skeletons could belong to a being similar, or perhaps a relative of ours...for example (don't laugh) sasquatch. Are you telling me we can identify the DNA of skeletal remains hundreds of thousands of years old, but somehow the DNA of the starchild skull is a mystery? Maybe there is something at work behind the scenes? Who knows, I just don't think we will truly get it all figured out for some time. For now, they are all just theories.

Here is information on another exhibit - Turkana Boy:

www.talkorigins.org...

iscovered by Kamoya Kimeu in 1984 at Nariokotome near Lake Turkana in Kenya (Brown et al.1985; Leakey and Lewin, 1992; Walker and Leakey, 1993). This is an almost complete skeleton of an 11 or 12 year old boy, the only major omissions being the hands and feet. (Some scientists believe erectus matured faster than modern humans, and that he was really about 9 years old (Leakey and Lewin 1992).) It is the most complete known specimen of H. erectus, and also one of the oldest, at 1.6 million years. The brain size was 880 cc, and it is estimated that it would have been 910 cc at adulthood (a modern human of comparable size would be expected to have a brain size of about 1350 cc). The boy was 160 cm (5'3") tall, and estimates are that he might have been about 185 cm (6'1") as an adult. Except for the skull, the skeleton is very similar to that of modern boys, although there are a number of small differences. The most striking is that the holes in his vertebrae, through which the spinal cord goes, have only about half the cross-sectional area found in modern humans. One suggested explanation for this is that the boy lacked the fine motor control we have in the thorax to control speech, implying that he wasn't nearly as fluent a speaker as modern humans are (Walker and Shipman 1996).

Here is his skull (from the above article):
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/d3033529a62d.jpg[/atsimg]

Here is the reconstruction from the Stenckenberg Natural History Museum exhibition (Daily Mail):
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/34bb0ecda66c.jpg[/atsimg]

I found this reconstruction of him (by Gary Sawyer):
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/4ca87e232d47.jpg[/atsimg]




[edit on 24-3-2010 by berenike]

reply to post by berenike


Thank you for this thread. The man from over 800,000 years ago looks remarkably close to modern man. If I had not been told the age, I would say he is modern man.

Very interesting to see how we have changed or evolved.

reply to post by lambs to lions


I think the title of the newspaper article (and my thread) may not be exactly right, calling all these beings 'Man's early ancestors'.

For now though, I'll keep my thread title as it is, if only to keep it short.

I'm hoping that all the extra articles I'm linking to will help to provide a fuller picture.

Originally posted by randyvs
I doubt Darwins theory, even he had that much sense. Why argue about it
though, we all die. So we will all find out Gods truth in the end.
Good thread.

[edit on 24-3-2010 by randyvs]

What if we don't find the truth when we are dead? What if we are just dead?

I want to know the truth! This is important. Religions are based around creating stories of how humans came into existence and wage wars over other peoples beliefs.

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Great post! I wish i lived in europe.

Those old apes are so chimpanzee like it's not even funny. Here are two photos of chimpanzees, bonobo and common.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/files/99aadfaf2df18d81.jpg[/atsimg]

As you can see, the brows and the nose are exactly like chimpanzees.

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Also look at the Orangutan male that i photographed and how close it looks to one of the 1.8million year old apes:

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/files/75c5bc4018939c2e.jpg[/atsimg]

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If anyone enjoys my comparisons please let me know and i will do one for the chimpanzee and gorilla, the other current great apes. To me this almost proves that the great apes are in fact the missing link. Who cares about finding a link from great apes to monkeys, its all about finding the link from great ape to human.

reply to post by BeastMaster2012


I'd be interested in any more comparisons you can do.

Here's a Time article from 1999:
www.stephenjaygould.org...

Small quote from a very interesting article:

But there's now only one species of human on the planet, and in the simplified view of evolution most of us have, that's all there has ever been. A few million years ago, most of us think, the half-ape known as Lucy appeared in Africa; eventually she begat a less apelike creature, who evolved in turn into something even more humanlike. Finally, after a few more begettings, Homo sapiens appeared. Except for that odd side branch known as the Neanderthals, the path from proto-apes to modern humans is commonly seen as a succession of new and improved species taking the place of worn-out evolutionary clunkers.

It's a satisfying, if slightly chauvinistic tale, but experts in human evolution have known for years that it is dead wrong. The evolution of a successful animal species almost always involves trial and error, false starts and failed experiments. "Humans are no exception to this," says anthropologist Ian Tattersall of the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, "no matter what we like to think."

True, we're descended from a creature that split off from the apes millions of years ago. But subsequent events were hardly a steady march from primitivism to perfection. Human evolution more nearly resembled an elimination tournament. At just about any given moment in prehistory, our family tree included several species of hominids—erect, upright-walking primates. All were competitors in an evolutionary struggle from which only one would ultimately emerge. Then came yet another flowering of species that would compete for survival. Neanderthals simply represented the most recent version of that contest. And while we'd find it bizarre to share our world with another human species, the fact that we've been alone since the Neanderthals vanished some 30,000 years ago is an evolutionary aberration.

The notion that multiple human species are the norm, not the exception, has only got stronger with a series of major scientific discoveries. Since 1994, four new species of hominid have been added to the human family tree, with the latest announced just a few months ago. These date from 800,000 years ago all the way back to 4.4 million years B.P. (before the present).

This is also from a 1999 issue of Time Magazine (I think it's the same issue):




[edit on 24-3-2010 by berenike]

reply to post by berenike
Nice thread! If you'd called it 'Faces of the First Annunaki Slave Races,' it'd be on a 100 flags already. SnF for adding a quality thread in my favourite section (despite the source).

The images are compelling and underline the often overlooked fact that history is an inter-disciplinary subject. To discover, record, date and identify the skulls used a lot of team work. The forensic history of facial reconstruction is an outcome of seeking to identify murder victims.

Last year, I posted a thread that illustrated the science behind history. A 9000 year old skeleton was found in a cave in the UK. Facial reconstruction of the skull provided this guy...

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/9d012b1949f8.gif[/atsimg]

By luck, DNA-sampling of local inhabitants revealed a descendent living nearby. Pretty cool? This is the guy...

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/b721c02fd437.gif[/atsimg]

Maybe it's just me...they look similar

The thread is...9000 Year Old Grandparent

Here is some more information on Zinj:

www.archaeology.org...

On July 17, 1959 paleoanthropologist Mary Leakey discovered a fossilized skull from a previously unknown species of hominid that she and husband Louis Leakey named Zinjanthropus boisei. The 1.75-million-year-old fossil from Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania, turned the Leakey's into household names, and firmly established that the roots of the human family tree extended deep into antiquity. The name of the genus "Zinjanthropus" has since been dropped. Whether the fossil belongs to the genus Australopithecus along with its smaller cousins, Australopithecus afarensis and A. africanus, or deserves to be part of a separate genus called Paranthropus along with other large hominid species like Paranthropus robustus has been the subject of debate. Some population of the smaller, or gracile, Australopithecines were the ancestors of Homo habilis, Homo erectus, and eventually Homo sapiens, while Paranthropus was probably an evolutionary dead end. Whatever genus the fossil is assigned to, it is no longer believed to be a direct ancestor of modern humans, but one of a number of hominid species that lived in Africa millions of years ago. In honor of the 50th anniversary of this discovery, ARCHAEOLOGY Senior Editor Zach Zorich interviewed Mary and Louis's son Richard Leakey who still conducts paleoanthropological research in Kenya along with his wife Meave and daughter Louise. In addition to his scientific career, Richard is also an influential figure in Kenyan politics and wildlife conservation.

Here is is picture taken from the Daily Mail article and a little bit of background detail:
[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/febf94814b2e.jpg[/atsimg]

Researchers shaped this skull on the basis of this discovery of 'Zinj' in 1959. The adult male lived 1.8million years ago in the Olduvai Gorge of Tanzania. He would have fed himself on seeds, plants and roots which he dug out with bones

Kandinsky - I just got my 300th flag (thanks everybody) this week, after being here for nearly two years and NOW you tell me

Hey kids - come over to my Ancient Faces thread, we've got an Annunaki on there.

Kidding


[edit on 24-3-2010 by berenike]

reply to post by BeastMaster2012


It may be the case that those "ancestors" actually degraded into today's apes.
I am serious.
It is a known fact that today's humans have 10% smaller cranium volume than those from 150.000 ago.


[edit on 24-3-2010 by DangerDeath]

Originally posted by lambs to lions
I have a feeling that something just isn't right about the theory of evolution in regarding human from ape.

Probably because that's not what evolution says. It says that apes and humans evolved from a common earlier common primate ancestor almost 6 million years ago.

So we're primates, but we're not apes. Apes are a different species:
en.wikipedia.org...

A wonderful find, and wonderful reconstruction work!

Too often these types of reconstructions pander to a "primitive humans looked like weird chimpanzees" sort of concept instead of showing simply the face without color or hair. The "bare bones" wireframe is somehow more compelling and seems more honest than the artful ones.

I get tired of the "chimpy-neanderthal" drawings. Really I do.

Originally posted by DangerDeath
reply to post by BeastMaster2012

 

It may be the case that those "ancestors" actually degraded into today's apes.
I am serious.
It is a known fact that today's humans have 10% smaller cranium volume than those from 150.000 ago.


[edit on 24-3-2010 by DangerDeath]

That is very possible! If these reconstructions are anywhere near true, this is amazing! I really think they are the distant relatives of the great apes and maybe not humans.

Here is a line of thinking.
Modern technology - nano-technology plus genetics, enable us to now (or in the near future) create DNA. At that particular moment, technology becomes/replaces biology, and theory of evolution bows to creationist theory.

Now, if this had happened before, how are we to understand evolution? As some progressive or regressive development?

In my opinion, this is a serious question, not a trick question.

Well Mrs. Ples and the Bonobos are almost an exact match.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/files/9db9732ef1c1c633.jpg[/atsimg]

The ears, lips, nose and brow are insanely similar.

I am starting to believe that whoever constructed these could have been bull#ting and could be just messing with us because this is too eerie.