ORIGIN OF MAN.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIII, Issue 288, 2 November 1933, Page 9

ORIGIN OF MAN.

RESEARCH EXPEDITIONS. Two missing links in man’s descent have now been established, says the Times, London, referring to the pronouncement by Dr. L. S. B. Leakey, leader of the archaeology research expeditions to East Africa since 1926. He told the Anthropological Institute that he was now satisfied that the lvanjera skulls must be regarded as true specimens of primitive man, and thus the oldest authenticated specimens yet discovered.

He added that the Kanam mandible, which the East African expedition also discovered, belonged to a remoter period, perhaps Pliocene, but in view of the X-ray examination of the roots of the teeth, lie considered it should rank as a new species of primitive man, to he regarded as man’s true ancestor, at least as old as the Java, Pekin and Piltdown specimens. The fragment of the femur accompanying the lianjera skulls belonged to a muscular man who walked fullv erect. Dr. Leakey has thus taken the history of man further back than elsewhere in the world, supporting Darwin’s theory that Africa was the cradle of the human race, says the Times.