Archaeologists said they have found fossilized remains of a primitive human species that lived in the Three Gorges Area in Southwest China more than 2 million years ago, the earliest ever found in the country.
The findings, including a lower jawbone fragment, an incisor and more than 230 pieces of stone tools, prove that what is called Wushan man, is more than 300,000 years older than Yuanmou man, discovered in southwestern Yunnan Province in the 1960s and previously recognized as China's earliest human species.
An expert team led by Huang Wanbo, a professor with the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology under the Chinese Academy of Sciences, reached the conclusion after more than two decades of excavation at the Longgupo site in Wushan County, Chongqing Municipality.
"It's an exciting discovery because it may rewrite China's history," Huang said.
He said his team unearthed the human fossils during their first excavation, from 1985 to 1988. In the same stratigraphic interval, they also discovered fossils of 120 species of vertebrates, including 116 mammals, and a large number of stone artifacts.
"Various dating techniques corroborate the geological layer containing Wushan Man fossils being as old as 2 million to 2.04 million years, but we think we need more evidence," Huang said.
Huang's team conducted two excavations from 1997 to 1999 and from 2003 to 2006 at the Longgupo site with partners from Britain, Canada and France.
"The most important findings are the many leg fossils of animals, such as the elephant, rhinoceros and deer fossils we found in an area no more than 2 sq m," Huang said.
（英語點津 Celene 編輯）
About the broadcaster:
Marc Checkley is a freelance journalist and media producer from Auckland, New Zealand. Marc has an eclectic career in the media/arts, most recently working as a radio journalist for NewstalkZB, New Zealand’s leading news radio network, as a feature writer for Travel Inc, New Nutrition Business (UK) and contributor for Mana Magazine and the Sunday Star Times. Marc is also a passionate arts educator and is involved in various media/theatre projects in his native New Zealand and Singapore where he is currently based. Marc joins the China Daily with support from the Asia New Zealand Foundation.
