All,
Here are two items that describe a recent discovery made at a new site called Tianyuan Cave, in the general Zhoukoudian area.
Jacques Cinq-Mars
Archaeologists Discover 25,000-Year-Old Human Bones near Beijing
VOA News
08 Jul 2003, 20:01 UTC
Archaeologists in China say they have unearthed the bones of a 25,000-year-old human outside Beijing - the only existing human remains of that age in the area.
China's state media reported the find on Tuesday. It said the bones were discovered in a cave at Zhoukoudian, near the site where the world-renowned "Peking Man" fossils were unearthed in 1929. That earlier find lent support to the theory that human beings evolved from apes.
Chinese scientists say the new fossils could provide an important link between Peking Man, who lived about 500,000 years ago, and modern humans. The recent discovery includes a human jaw with teeth and bones from the shoulder, leg, arm and spine.
Archaeologists say they believe the fossils may have belonged to an adult male whose anatomy was similar to that of modern humans. They say the period in which the man lived, 20,000-100,000 years ago, was a crucial one in the evolution of humankind.
Archaeologists have been working in the Zhoukoudian area since the 1920s. It was among the first places in China to be added to United Nations' World Heritage List.
CHINESE ACADEMY OF SCIENCES News.
Human fossils of late Pleistocene age excavated in Beijing.
2003-7-8.
In a cave located in Beijing's Zhoukoudian, where the world famous Peking Man and Upper Cave Man were discovered about 70 years ago, researchers from the CAS Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP) have unearthed skeletal materials of a man who is thought to have lived about 25,000 years ago.
The fauna recovered from the cave suggest that the fossilized human remains were of late Homo Sapiens of the late Pleistocene age, according to Wu Xinzhi, a CAS member with IVPP.
The find is the only existing human fossils from this period in Beijing, says CAS Vice President Chen Yiyu. A complete skull from the same period, Upper Cave Man (or Shangdindong Man about 18,000 yeas old), was discovered in 1930, but was lost during the war against Japanese aggression from 1937 to 1945.
In 2001, workers with Beijing Tianyuan forestry farm discovered a cave (now named Tianyuan Cave) containing animal fossils while looking for a spring. A scientific excavation was officially started on June 16 by a research team headed by Prof. Tong Haowen from IVPP.
CLICK HERE, for the full CAS release.
