Faking it? why bother?
This is all about that space between archeology and prehistory. Please remove your minds from the gutter. :)
In the past, I've written a little about Eoanthropus, aka Piltdown Man, the famous fossil human found in early 20th century Britain. The fossil turned out to be a hoax, the conjoined bits coming from an orang utang and a human; nobody* questioned it or the people who found it, as it fit so neatly into then-current theories regarding what the ancestor of humans was like {human brain, ape jaws}.
Now, various conspiracy theories exist, as to who perpetrated the Hoax Of The Century. Was it either of the men who'd dug it up? Was it one of their friends and confidants? Or was it the legendary Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, author of the adventures of Sherlock Holmes, eager to prove how easily men could be tricked if the evidence pointed in one way?
And it only just now hit me -- yes, Piltdown Man was a hoax. But what if it were a hoax to cover up the remains of an actual fossil? What if there really had been a fossil ape endemic to pre-Neandertal Europe? But why wouldn't they shout their real discovery to the four corners of the world? A British missing link would be feted and boasted of for years - it really was anyway, even with the hoax. Exactly what might those men have found in the fields near Piltdown?
Would the approach of World War One have had an effect upon the cover-up? Motivation, perhaps? I doubt it, but then, my mind is not geared to think conspiratorially.
The only reason I can think of, for them to fake Piltdown Man when they had a real one at hand, was if the original Eoanthropus fossil was of a missing link even more primitive than Dart's skulls. Imagine it - you defeat the Boers soundly in war, yet they have the more advanced and developed human fossils; quite the potential embarassment.
Thoughts?
* = this is the part of the story I have trouble believing: that nobody, not even Dart, questioned the Eoanthropus material.
In the past, I've written a little about Eoanthropus, aka Piltdown Man, the famous fossil human found in early 20th century Britain. The fossil turned out to be a hoax, the conjoined bits coming from an orang utang and a human; nobody* questioned it or the people who found it, as it fit so neatly into then-current theories regarding what the ancestor of humans was like {human brain, ape jaws}.
Now, various conspiracy theories exist, as to who perpetrated the Hoax Of The Century. Was it either of the men who'd dug it up? Was it one of their friends and confidants? Or was it the legendary Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, author of the adventures of Sherlock Holmes, eager to prove how easily men could be tricked if the evidence pointed in one way?
And it only just now hit me -- yes, Piltdown Man was a hoax. But what if it were a hoax to cover up the remains of an actual fossil? What if there really had been a fossil ape endemic to pre-Neandertal Europe? But why wouldn't they shout their real discovery to the four corners of the world? A British missing link would be feted and boasted of for years - it really was anyway, even with the hoax. Exactly what might those men have found in the fields near Piltdown?
Would the approach of World War One have had an effect upon the cover-up? Motivation, perhaps? I doubt it, but then, my mind is not geared to think conspiratorially.
The only reason I can think of, for them to fake Piltdown Man when they had a real one at hand, was if the original Eoanthropus fossil was of a missing link even more primitive than Dart's skulls. Imagine it - you defeat the Boers soundly in war, yet they have the more advanced and developed human fossils; quite the potential embarassment.
Thoughts?
* = this is the part of the story I have trouble believing: that nobody, not even Dart, questioned the Eoanthropus material.