Lovelock "giants" revisited (Post 2)

This is the second of three posts about the redheaded giant Indians discovered in Lovelock Cave, Nevada in the early 1900s. My first post commented the account given by the local Paiute natives, as recorded in Sarah Winnemucca's book, published in 1883, the scientific report onthe excavation sin Lovelock Cave by Lowe and Harrington in 1929, and John T. Reid, a local geologist and anthropologist who had explored the site and spoke to the guano miners who discovered it in 1911.

This is the full series
Post 1 - Lovelock "giants" revisited"
Post 2 - Lovelock "giants" revisited

January 2014 post mentioning Lovelock Cave.

The giants were not so gigantic

I found more information about Reid and the redheaded giants, in an article titled John Reid's Redheaded "Giants" of Central Nevada: Fact or Fiction? by Sheilagh Brooks, Carolyn Stark and Richard H. Brooks, published in the Nevada Historical Society Quarterly of Fall 1984. The authors analyze the size of the bones unearthed at Lovelock Cave and conclude they were not giants. They also try to explain the red color of these people (they were redheaded).

Lovelock Cave. Ken Lund

Background

Reid collected bones from many sites in this region in northwestern-central Nevada over the course of the years. His private collection included many artifacts too, but the core of it were the fourteen skulls and skeletons of this readheaded group of natives. The collection was acquired in 1984 by the Nevada Historical Society, and analyzed in depth.

The article sites Reid's biography by James Graves Scrugham, published in 1935 who wrote: "One of his great finds was a skeleton, found ahout twenty miles southerly of Lovelock, Nevada, showing that the body of which it was a framework, was exactly seven feet, seven inches tail. It is one of the "giant men" of an ancient race of which skeletons were unearthed in Central Nevada. (1935:228-229)" This is a remarkable height 7 ft. 7" is 2.31 meters tall!

The book then describes the tribe to which this person belonged, they seem to summarize the information provided by Winnemucca and Natchez that I transcribed in my first post:

"... a race of extremely tall redhaired people, referred to as Tule Eaters, who lived in the Humboldt Sink area. These people frequently were described as cruel, wicked, and possibly cannibalistic. Supposedly the Northern Paiutes feared and hated them. According to one version of the story, fighting broke out between the Giants and the Northern Paiutes. The Northern Paiutes chased the Giants into Lovelock Cave and covered the entrance with brush, which they fired to suffocate the Giants. Those Giants who tried to get out of the cave were shot by the Northern Paiutes' best marksmen. Some of the Giants did escape, and the fighting continued into the Humboldt Sink and around Pyramid Lake. All of the male Giants were killed, but a few of the females survived and later mated with Northern Paiute men. In some versions a few escaped and were chased to the northwest of Lovelock Cave; in other versions, they ended up as far away as Tule Lake, California."

I highlighted a new piece of information, that the surviving "giant" women were taken into the Paiute tribe as brides, and, the other version, that some escaped to Tule Lake in California. This lake (see it in Google maps) is 320 km (200 mi.) northwest of Lovelock, close to the California-Oregon state line.

Why did Reid conclude that these people were giants? He measured their femora (thigh bones) and compared them with his knee-to-hip distance. Simple maths lead him to calculate heights ranging from 7 ft. 7" to 9 ft. 6", 2.31 m to 2.9 m. These were tall men!

The hair was also reddish: "Hair is preserved on some of the skulls, which still have soft tissues adhering. The hair is a brownish red in color, confirming the description in the Redheaded Giant stories of these people being red haired. Because of his size estimates and the hair color, Reid was certain that he had found and identified the Redheaded Giants described in the Northern Paiute stories he had heard in his youth."

Many of the bones don't belong to complete skeletons, and the exact origin of many of them is unknown. Not all of them came from Lovelock Cave. The authors assume, that they came from Lake Humboldt and Lake Pyramid region, but are not certain of their provenance.

Furthermore, their dating is not known. They could be remains spanning tousands of years, from different ethnic groups. The authors treat them as belonging to a single time period. With these caveats, they concluded that the remains were of a normal stature. Not giants.

Only six male specimens had femora, and these were measured and using a formula devised by Trotter and Gleser, they estimated the height of these individuals, using left and right thigh bones, the range of heights was: 1.66 m to 1.79 m (5 ft 5" to 5 ft 11") plus minus 2" (5 cm). These are similar to other remains collected in the region in known sites.

The authors conclude that "some of the individual males were relatively tall" but the calculated values "in no way qualifies those persons as giants. Also, others were short for males..."

Their hair was red

The remains had red hair, and the article has two explanations: (1) the use of ochre, and (2) chemical action by natural decomposition and mummification.

"In the Reid Collection there are semi-mummified skeletons, and also in the burials recovered from Lovelock Cave by Loud and Harrington (1929). These are natural mummies, preserved by the arid climate. The hair of the mummies in the Reid Collection, when preserved, is a reddish-brown color. From archaeological research, and from ethno-historical accounts, data have been accumulated demonstrating that many of the Great Basin Native American Indian groups painted themselves while alive, and also painted their dead, with red ochre.
Red ochre is a mineral paint which colors anything a reddish-brown or orangish-brown shade. The significance of red ochre is that as a mineral it will not disintegrate, if placed on a body prior to burial, when the soft tissues deteriorate. If the body becomes fully skeletalized, the red ochre will then stain the bones after the soft tissues have gone. Red ochre also will color hair, changing black hair into a reddish or rusty-brown shade.
Also after burial, either during the drying out of the soft tissues of the body, or during their disintegration, these tissues release various fluids, which will dye or stain hair if it is preserved. One component of these fluids is ammonia, which dyes black hair a reddish or orangish shade.
Either one or both of these methods of staining preserved hair could have affected the mummies in the Reid Collection, and also those collected hy Loud and Harrington (1929) from Lovelock Cave. This reddish or rusty-brown coloring for the hair of mummies is not unusual in regions where the natural aridity of the climate has preserved the bodies and the hair as natural mummies."

The explanations sound reasonable. Ochre has been used by humans and other hominins over hundreds of thousands of years, and natural processes can change the color of hair. There has been speculation about readheaded Amerindians (see this post, and this post), and mythical redheaded creatures among Native Americans, like the Trauco or the Corupira) but no tangible archaeological proof of their existence.

The 1984 article concludes that "The archaeological materials associated with the burials removed by Loud and Harrington are of types expected to occur in that area of the Great Basin at that prehistoric time period. There is no substantiation that a group of people with a differing culture pattern, who might fit the description in the stories of Redheaded Giants, lived in Lovelock Cave, Pyramid Lake, or Humboldt Sink during the prehistoric period. Nor is there any evidence of death by violence observed on the skeletons of the Reid Collection, and the description of the burials found by Loud and Harrington indicates that they originally had been carefully prepared for burial".

My next post, the third in this series will follow an article by Dorothy Dansie, published in 1975, with more sources on John Reid and the redheaded giants.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2026 by Austin Whittall © 

Lovelock "giants" revisited (Post 1)

Nearly 17 years ago I wrote a post about the Lovelock Skull and Spirit Cave Man - Nevada and quoted a short paragraph form a book written by a Paiute woman named Sarah Hopinks Winnemucca in 1883: Life among the Piutes, their wrongs and claims. Putnam’s. N. York. p 73. In it she describes how her people fought against a "small tribe of barbarians" who were cannibals, and who "had reddish hair". I remarked that redheadedness was uncommon among Amerindians but that Neanderthals carried a gene responsible for red tinted hair and suggested that "maybe a band of relict Neanderthals lived in Nevada until quite recently and were wiped out by the Paiute."

The story is longer and far more entertaining than my brief post revealed. Today's post will look into other sources about these redheaded Indians, which, according to some witnesses, were giants.

This is the full series of posts on Lovelock Cave's "giants"
Post 1 - Lovelock "giants" revisited"
Post 2 - Lovelock "giants" revisited

January 2014 post mentioning Lovelock Cave.

The Version given by Sarah Winnemucca: Redheaded Cannibals

Sarah Winnemucca, 1883 portrait. Source

This is what Sarah Winnemucca (1841-1895) wrote in her book (she had learned to read and write in English at a Mormon school in Genoa, Nevada):

"Among the traditions of our people is one of a small tribe of barbarians who used to live along the Humboldt River. It was many hundred years ago. They used to waylay my people and kill and eat them. They would dig large holes in our trails at night, and if any of our people travelled at night, which they did, for they were afraid of these barbarous people, they would oftentimes fall into these holes. That tribe would even eat their own dead —yes, they would even come and dig up our dead after they were buried, and would carry them off and eat them. Now and then they would come and make war on my people. They would fight, and as fast as they killed one another on either side, the women would carry off those who were killed. My people say they were very brave. When they were fighting they would jump up in the air after the arrows that went over their heads, and shoot the same arrows back again. My people took some of them into their families, but they could not make them like themselves. So at last they made war on them. This war lasted a long time. Their number was about twenty-six hundred (2600). The war lasted some three years. My people killed them in great numbers, and what few were left went into the thick bush. My people set the bush on fire. This was right above Humboldt Lake."

So, here we hava a band of "bararians", "Barbarous people", who were cannibals, warmongering and "very brave". The Paiute tried to integrate them but they couldn't adapt. The story goes on, describing how the barbarians fled in boats made from bulrushes known as Tule, across Lake Humboldt, and were picked off by the Paiute as they landed. They hid in a cave (Lovelock Cave) and were killed every time they left the cave to fetch water. The Paiute asked them if they'd quit their bad ways: "My people would ask them if they would be like us, and not eat people like coyotes or beasts. They talked the same language, but they would not give up." So finally they gathered wood and dry bushes and burned them alive in their cave. Winnemucca added: "This tribe was called people-eaters".

This took place in west-central Nevada, not far from its capital city, Reno. See Humboldt Lake in Google Maps. The map also shows the location of Lovelock Cave. The area is now barren, but during the period following the last Ice Age, it was a well watered region with lakes (the lake is pictured below, Source).

Then she mentions that they were redheaded:

"My people say that the tribe we exterminated had reddish hair. I have some of their hair, which has been handed down from father to son. I have a dress which has been in our family a great many years, trimmed with this reddish hair. I am going to wear it some time when I lecture. It is called the mourning dress, and no one has such a dress but my family."

The discovery of Lovelock Cave

The cave is mentioned by Llewllyn L. Loud and M.R. Harrington in their scholarly account about their excavations at the cave (See their book: Lovelock Cave, 1929. For a full description of their activities there).

Loud visited the site in 1911 once the mining of bat guano from the cave had concluded. During the mining period, bones and artifacts had been found in the cave, and many were destroyed, lost, or sold to private collectors. Starting in 1912, Loud recovered thousands of artifacts. In 1924, a new expedition conducted by Harrington went to the cave, Loude assisted him. The book includes accounts given by Gilbert Natches in 1914, Gilbert was the grandson of Sarah Winnemucca, her account about the cave, and the story of its discovery by White men, given by John. T. Reid.

Interestingly, Gilbert Natches mentioned a Paiute myth about abstaining from killing bears and using their fur: "bear meat was never eaten, because bears are just the same as a person. They understand our language and know when they are being talked about even at a distance." This is similar to what Winnemucca had said about the man-eaters "They talked the same language" as the Paiute. So maybe the redheaded people didn't speak the Paiute language.

Lowe and Harrington report the Paiute's belief in "supernatural creatures", who attributed to them the stone tools made in different shapes, and from different types of stones to the ones they knapped:

"They had spears and no arrows, while the Northern Paiute had arrows but no spears. They were mean, contemptible, foolish, degraded cannibals, had red hair which they were excessively fond of decorating with bone ornaments, and yet w'ere so poor that they dressed in robes made of the skin and feathers of the mud hen. In a collection of specimens from Nevada every object w'hich is unfamiliar to a Northern Paiute is attributed to them.
In the mind of the Northern Paiute they are often associated with the Pit River Indians among whom a remnant are even supposed to exist today. The Pit River Indians are called by the Paiute sai’i, which is also the name of the ancient people, but the possible reason for this is that both peoples are held in contempt.
Of the ancient sai ’i there were two bands. The first band, which is conceived, like any band or “family” of Northern Paiute, to consist of only a few hundred individuals, lived at Humboldt lake until exterminated by the Northern Paiute... " [Source]

The book mentions Sarah Winnemucca's account (transcribed further up) including it as Appendix III, and reports that Gilbert had heard this same account from his grandmother who had learned it from her grandfather.

Lowe comments on Sarah's story and notes that " Much of the hair found on the mummies in the cave is reddish. Similar hair is known from mummies from the Pueblo region, Peru, and elsewhere, the color being due to age or chemical action." He also notes that "The Northern Paiute applied to the ancient people the name sai-duka’a, “tule-eaters,” a name which might be applied to any people with this habit. This may account for the application of the name or its shortened form sai’i to the Pit River Indians and the form Saidyuka to Indians of eastern Oregon".

Tule (Schoenoplectus acutus) is a variety of bulrush that grows in North America and which the natives used to weave baskets, mats, clothes, tents, and watercaraft. The tender shoots can be eaten, and the roots (rhizomes) and flowers are boiled like vegetables. The old, tough roots, can be boiled and mashed to remove the fiber to produce flour. So the name "tule eaters" or Sai-duka'a (also written Si-Te-Cah) given to these people is quite reasonable.

Finally, in Appendix IV, it gives "John T. Reid’s Accounts Of Lovelock Cave" which we will discuss below.

John T. Reid

John T. Reid, born in 1871 in Unionville, Nevada, died 1943 in Lovelock, Nevada. His father ran the General Store there between 1883 and 1895, and John was a clerk. He later became a geologist and mining engineer. His intimate knowledge of the natives and his interest in anthropology and archaeology led him to investigate the local sites, and also befriend the natives. Below is his portrait.

John T. Reid, portrait. Source

This is the account given by Reid to Lowe (Source). Captain Natches is Gilbert Natches. Highlight is mine:

"I recall that along about 1887, when I was about 16 years old, Captain Natches, two other Indians, one known locally as “Coffee Charley,” the other as “Mustache Charley,” and myself had undertaken to catch some wild horses that roamed in the neighborhood of the Carson and Humboldt sinks. In due time we came in contact with the wild horses, and then the chase was on. After running those horses all day long we were obliged to camp over night near the southern end of the Humboldt sink and on its eastern shore. The next morning we resumed the chase, following the horses over into the Carson Sink desert. But here we had to turn around, homeward bound, since we had no fresh saddle horses available to pursue the mustangs further.
On the way back we passed Lovelock cave, and the hour being late wo decided to camp there for the night. Later, Captain Natches related to me the great calamity which had occurred in that cave to another race of people who had been exterminated by the Piutes.
In the tale that Natches related, with the other two Indians aiding him in bringing out all of the material facts that had any connection, I was informed that about four or five generations back the Indians had fought to extermination a people who were redheaded and who spoke their own language. The fact that these two people spoke tho same language suggests that they had lived together for a long period of time.
Natches assigned no reason for the origin of the trouble between the two races, and I doubt if he knew or had a history, although his sister, Sarah Winnemucca Hopkins, states that these people were cannibals and ate the Piutes. This is hardly compatible with her further statement that the Piutes had taken some of these people into their own families.
Annie Lowry, a half breed, who married an Indian named Mr. Sanny, assigned as a reason for the trouble between the two races that these people had stolen their women and taken their wild rice seed away from them.
I rather think that the matter of food was the trouble and the Piutes decided after a period of droughts that they would exterminate the other people who were consumers of the small amount, that was all the while getting smaller and smaller, of food that was available in the form of wild seeds and wild fowl that visited the lakes.
Natches stated that these people had come from the southwest. A battle had waged for a long time on the Carson sink at some sand hills on the east and west side of the Carson river, after which the Piutes had driven these people northward into the region of the Humboldt lake, thence across the lake to the cave, some going into the cave while others went northward.
From what I learned through Natches, and from numerous others of the old Indians, I have deduced that this redheaded people had long occupied the territory about the cave before the Piute Indian had come from elsewhere.
Natches further related how the Piute Indians had gathered sagebrush in great quantity around and about the hills adjacent to the cave and assembled it on the bluff above the cave. Then they had lighted and thrown it down immediately in front of the cave. The Piutes staid on either side of the cave, at a safe distance, and watched for the people within to come out for food or water, or to escape the smoke which in part penetrated the cave. As they came out they were dispatched with well-directed arrows."

The story told to Reid by Gilbert Natches and his companions is identical to the one told by Sarah Winnemucca. But it seems that some of the readheaded people managed to escape unharmed fleeing north.

Lowe then transcribes an account that John Reid had heard from James H. Hart (Source). Hart and David Pugh filed a mineral claim on the cave to mine bat guano deposits in 1911. James Hart said:

"In 1911 I heard David Pugh of Lovelock tell of an old Indian cave some twenty miles south of Lovelock. He said that it was full of bat guano in which he had dug down four feet. When a boy he had learnt from the Indians where the cave was. There had then been fires in it for there was much smoke on the walls. Realizing that if the cave was as large as described the guano might be of value, I arranged with Pugh to file a mineral location upon it and ship out the guano. This we did, working from the fall of 1911 to the spring of 1912. We drove a small tunnel into the mouth of the cave, or rather to one side of it, the natural opening being too small to work through. We took out about five car-loads of guano which were shipped to the Hawaiian Fertilizer Company of San Francisco. Wd soon began to discover Indian relics, and notified Dr. J. C. Merriam of the University of California, who took the matter up with the University of Nevada and the Nevada Historical Society. We also wrote to the Smithsonian Institution, but they advised that they had no funds for collecting, receiving only donations. After some of the best specimens had been destroyed, we received word from the State Historical Society that, in conjunction with the University of California, they would send an investigator. This was Mr. Loud. We gave him all possible facilities for collecting. Many objects had been destroyed by the weather and others had been taken away. I recall many boas or ropes of fine feathers. As these lay strewn about in the open end of the cave in the way of the workmen they were irreparably damaged. Some of these boas were found perfectly preserved. All the Indian objects began to appear about four feet below the surface of the guano.
In the south end of the cave, "about twenty feet deep," we unearthed some skeletons. In the north-central part of the cave, about four feet deep, was a striking looking body of a man "six feet six inches tall." His body was mummified and his hair distinctly red. There was a grass rope about his neck with a knot under the left ear. The rope was about eight feet long. The feet were bound together from the ankle to above the knees with stout rope. The mummification was complete except for a part of the abdomen. The other mummies all had red hair — I think there were either four or five. Those that appeared to be women were small, something like a Japanese woman in height." This was not altogether due to the shrinking of the bodies in mummifying, because the man was “a giant.” The women had on moccasins which reached clear to the knees; the buckskin was beaded with shells. Two of them had on a kind of buckskin coat (gown) that came down to the knees. These bodies were from the deep south end of the cave.
There were no bats in the cave when we went there to work."

This is an eyewitness account of giant men six feet, six inches tall (1.98 m) which isn't gigantic, but, is tall. The women were smaller, suggesting sexual dimorphism, which isn't overly marked in humans but noticeable in other primates.

I also highlighted the remark about bats, let's see the relevance of bats in this story.

Bats and the date of the site

The arid and desert-like environment of Lake Humboldt, there are bats, like the little brown bat (Myotis lucifugus) in NW Nevada. They migrate and hibernate but live in small groups. There are over 20 bat species living in the state of Nevada. Any of them could have lived in the cave.

Bat excrement accumulates on the floor of the cave, beneath the bats hanging from the ceiling. This cave had 3 to 6 feet (90 to 180 cm) of guano (bat droppings, used as fertilizer) on its floor (see p. 8). But, as mentioned by Hart, in 1911 there were no bats in the cave. The accumulation of guano may have been old.

How quickly does guano accumulate in a cave? This depends on many factors. The seasonality of the bat population (do they live in the cave on a permanent basis, or move to other sites?), the population itself, and the cave chemistry. An example reported by Bogdanowicz et al., 2020 dated guano in two caves in Jamaica. In one, a core 81 cm long was dated to 200 years old, in the other, a 1.29 m long core was found to be 4300 years old. This confirms the different deposition speeds (4 mm per year in cave #1 and 0.3 mm per year in cave #2, a thirteen-fold difference.

Six feet of guano would have accumulated over a period of 450 to 6,000 years using the values given by Bogdanowicz. But it could have been even thicker; Lowe reports that "Before the arrival of the writer, 5 carloads of 50 (?) tons each had been taken from the cave for fertilizer. Besides this, a large quantity was left in the cave because it was so much mixed with other things that it no longer paid to ship it. Bat manure was sometimes found in nearly pure beds of perhaps several feet thickness." (p. 34) Lowe adds that "Although there was so large a quantity of bat guano in the cave no bats were seen during the writer’s stay; but a cowboy said that several years previously he had smoked out large numbers." Lowe and Hart saw no bats, is it reasonable to believe that they had been smoked out in the past?

While dealing with the bat excrement, Lowe says that "The human excrement in the cave reveals, on the part of the ancient inhabitants, an incredibly coarse diet of seeds, hulls, and tough plant fibers. Some of the excrement was over 2 inches in diameter." An amazingly fibrous diet, but also, weirdly large sized stool. Were these people human beings, or some plant-eating primate?

The bats, according to Shackley, M. Steven n.d. occupied the caves shortly after a wet period 7.000 years ago: "Heizer and Napton state that Lovelock Cave was occupied by bats at a date coinciding with the estimated end of the Altithermal perhaps as a direct result of the rejuvenation of Humboldt Lake. The initial buildup of the older bat guano layer may have begun ca. 5000 B. C. The earliest, although intermittent evidence of human occupation is in the Older Guano layer at ca. 2700 B. C. Bats and other creatures continued to inhabit the cave until about 2500 B. C. when human occupation began ca. 1500 B. C... Intensive occupation of the cave began ca. 1500 B. C. and continued until about A. D. 500. Due to a massive rockfall (ca. A. D. 440 ± 90) access to the interior of the cave was greatly impeded, but it continued to be utilized as a repository for the dead and for cache purposes. According to Heizer and Napton (1970: 41), human occupation of the interior of the cave was drastically curtailed, and this, together with the reduced illumination and air circulation made it attractive to bats. Thus, between A. D. 700 and A. D. 1911, a thick deposit of bat guano accumulated over the cultural deposits. Human occupation of the outer shelter and use of the inner cave probably continued until 1829."

So there is an "old" and a "new" period of guano buildup, one prior to 2,500 BC, the other after 700 AD. These are relatively recent.

In the second part of this three post series, we will look into more information about Reid and the redheaded giants, following John Reid's Redheaded "Giants" of Central Nevada: Fact or Fiction? by Sheilagh Brooks, Carolyn Stark and Richard H. Brooks, 1984. The authors conclude that the people buried in Lovelock cave were not giants and also explain their origin of their reddish hair.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2026 by Austin Whittall © 

Drimolen Cave in South Africa and the Eurasian Homo erectus

A paper published last week, on Sept. 30th, by archaeologists from La Trobe University, (Martin, J. M., Leece, A. B., Baker, S., Herries, A. I. R., & Strait, D. S. (2026). New hominin cranial and mandibular remains from Drimolen Main Quarry, South Africa. Annals of Human Biology, 53(1). https://doi.org/10.1080/03014460.2026.2725046) described the remains of bones discovered at the Drimolen site. They reached some interesting conclusions.

Drimolen Site

This site is located in a hotspot (there are other similar aged sites nearby —Sterkfontein, Swartkrans, Kromdraai, Coopers), see Google Map. The area is a UNESCO World Heritage site known as "Cradle of Humankind". The place, a quarry, was discovered in 1992, by chance by an amateur archaeologist named André Keyser in 1992. Diggings at the quarry found teeth, jaws, fragments of crania of different hominins, including unidentified Homo species, and Paranthropus robustus. The age of the remains spans a period from 1.5 to 2 million years ago.

The site was an old cave, that was infilled with sediments over the years, and into which animals and hominins fell, and were preserved in the dirt, that became a rock known as breccia (a conglomerate of sharp pebbles cemented together by fine graind sands). This setting, plus the fact that it was a lime quarry, makes me wonder if the old dates assigned to the specimens are accurate. See Herries et al., 2020 who describe the sediments, the now exposed remains of the cave, erosion, quarry alterations, etc. Which tend to downplay disturbed sedimentation, but confirm my suspicions that the site's dating could be skewed to antiquity to favor the OOA theory.

The remains have been described in different papers over the years, and this one is the most recent publication, that describes and identifies the species to which several fossils belong.

The authors identify one of the fossils, named DNH 127, as not belonging to the Paranthropus or the Australopiths. It is assigned to the erectus genus.

It was found in a block of rock that may have been part of a pinnacle (DNH 7) which had been dated (this shows that the dating of the remains is tentative, some fossils were found in situ, in the beds of sediments, others in loose soil. After all, this was a quarry and has disturbed rock beds).

They give it the same age given to the other specimens found in the DNH 7 bed. There was an erectus in the site, DNH 134, so scholars expected to find more. This paper assigns the DNH 127 remains to the Homo erectus group, and date it to ~1.98 million years ago.

Link with Dmanisi

Interestingly, they note that "Heuristically, the morphology preserved by DNH 127 most closely resembles that of D2700 from Dmanisi. Based on this mosaic of traits, we tentatively assign DNH 127 to Homo erectus sensu lato." This is revealing, Dmanisi in Georgia, is in the Caucasus, 9,200 km (5,700 mi) away, and it is the site with the oldest crania of Homo erectus in Eurasia. Their age is slightly younger than the age given to the Drimolen Cave specimen (at 1.8 million years old). But, since it was dated based on a conjectural belonging to a given pinnacle, it may be possible that the date is not precise. If so, the Dmanisi remains could be older, or possibly there are older remains yet to be discovered in Georgia. In this case, we could imagine a migration into Africa, from Eurasia, that reached South Africa 1.98 million years ago. The vanguard of these migrants met and coexisted with Paranthropus in this area.

By the way it is interesting how Herries et al., 2020 stress that the Drimolen erectus is older than Dmanisi. Like they need to reinforce the OOA and African origin of Homo genus: "At ~2.04 Ma ago (minimum age 1.95 Ma), DNH 134 is the most complete and oldest early Pleistocene Homo neurocranium in South Africa. DNH 134 is at least 100,000 to 150,000 years older than H. erectus s.l. specimens from Dmanisi... As such, DNH 134 represents the oldest fossil with affinities to H. erectus in the world. Despite this, we do not assert that the species necessarily evolved first in southern Africa, especially given major geological biases in hominin finds across Africa. However, the dating of the DNH 134 cranium to >1.95 Ma ago substantially weakens the hypothesis that H. erectus sensu lato evolved outside of Africa."

Other unclassified hominins

The paper also mentions that specimens SK 847 and StW 53 have not been classified yet, which "leaves open the possibility that more than one species of Homo may have been present on the landscape in southern Africa ∼2.0 Ma" It states that dental traits have led other authors to assign them to "Homo sp. indet. [but], there is not yet unequivocal evidence to suggest that more than one species of Homo is present within the DMQ assemblage" If so, there would be three or more species there (the other two being erectus and Paranthropus).

A 10 to 1 ratio of Paranthropus to erectus

The unusual ratio of bones between primitive Paranthropus and more evolved Homo erectus.

Although the paper itself does not mention this, it is noted in the University's media release (titled Fossils confirm human ancestors first appearance). In it, one of the coauthors of the paper is quoted as follows regarding Paranthropus and erectus (highlight is mine):

"... “These two human species shared the same landscape and are both preserved in Drimolen cave. While we know that Homo erectus and the lineage leading to us was ultimately the successful one, 2 million years ago P. robustus outnumbered Homo erectus at Drimolen by more than 10 to one. During this time period it was our ancestors that looked like the outside long-odds chance to survive,” Dr Martin said."

This remark drew my attention, why would one species outnumber the other ten to one? It seems that Paranthropus was well adapted to this location, its habitat and environment allowed them to proliferate and grow into a large, well established population. Primitive, the Paranthropus living in this area had larger teeth and jaws, forming a distinct species from other members of the group. This specific adapatation show that they were successful, and the dominant primates in this area.

The fewer erectus remains, however, seems to suggest that they were newcomers. They appear suddenly in the fossil record here, with few members and this hints at recent arrival, a migration of a small population (maybe from the northeast, spreading into a new territory).

The Homo group would be far more successful than Paranthropus but 2 million years ago, they were sharing their new home with very well adapted primates who outnumbered them ten to one.

It is likely that they exploited different resources from their habitat, perhaps the erectus were meat-eaters and gatherers, they made stone tools (though none have been reported here at Drimolen). The Paranthropus were apes, similar to chimps, who may have eaten plants, fruit, and tubers.

The Drimiolen quarry site suggests that erectus was a newcomer to South Africa, it does not prove that they were migrants, and it does not prove that they originated there, in South Africa. Their age, barely older than the oldest Eurasian erectus is used to suggest an African origin for erectus. But, it can't disprove an Eurasian origin and migration into Africa.

Further discoveries will clarify the mystery of the origin of erectus.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2026 by Austin Whittall © 

Study: American Natives arrived not before 21,000 years ago.

A research article published now, by Bethany Potter, Savannah Hay, Archana Singh, and Jennifer Raff (Genomic insights regarding early migrations into the Americas, Current Opinion in Genetics & Development. Volume 101, 2026, 102534, ISSN 0959-437X, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gde.2026.102534), explores the three alternatives for the peopling of America and chooses the middle of the road one. These alternatives are (1) Clovis First, sooner than 14,000 years ago, (2) Older than 25,0000 years before the Last Glacial Maximum, and (3) In between, from 21,000 to 14,000 years ago.

As expected, they accept a late peopling of Siberia, source of Native Americans, and mention the Yana River sites, 32,000 years ago. They choose the intermediate dates for genetic reasons, based on the current DNA studies (which, may I point out, set their dates based on the fossils!! A vicious circle.

They discard the older dates (older than 25,000 years) because of a lack of pre-sapiens sites (which, by the way, nobody looks for because it is not even considered as an option). The authors write: "If human paleogenomic data were recovered from the earliest claimed sites, we would expect such genomes to belong to Neanderthals, Denisovans, or an unknown lineage of early humans rather than to H. sapiens"

Then, they take the Out of Africa date (60,000 to 70,000 years ago) and agree that humans could have reached America around 40,000 years ago but "Patterns of archaic admixture present in the oldest Native American genomes (such as Upward Sun River, Anzick) are inconsistent with such a scenario ... the presence of humans in the Americas even shortly before the LGM is not immediately compatible with the genetic evidence present in ancient and contemporary Native Americans"

The evidence of an early presence of humans in America (like White Sands, NM, USA, which are 21,000 years old) is acknowledged and swept under the carpet: "Therefore, purported pre-LGM populations, such as the White Sands population (Table 1) must either belong to a lineage we have not yet sampled (unsurprising as we have very little genomic data from the Americas), a lineage that left no contemporary descendants, or perhaps a lineage that contained traces of ancestry seen in low proportions in later Native Americans, such as Population Y" (See my post on Population Y). And that is that.

The closing comments, mention that "Much of Homo sapiens’ evolutionary history involves repeated dispersals into continents that had already been inhabited by so-called ‘archaic’ hominins for hundreds of thousands of years. Genomic data show us that the dynamics of the peopling of the Americas were quite different..." This is true, but nobody has seriously looked for pre-sapiens presence in America. The Clovis Firsters, the lack of research funds in South America, the discrediting of old sites (i.e. Pedra Furada —mentioned in the paper with its name and 40 ky date, but not discussed. The same with Cerutti (∼130.0 kya), Topper (∼50 kya), and Chiquihuite Cave (∼32.0 kya). All sites are marked as "most contested" by mainstream orthodox archaeologists.

Comment

This article is a step in the right direction. It actually mentions the lack of archaic hominins in America. Neanderthals, H. erectus or Denisovans are never mentioned when the peopling of America is discussed. So, this is positive. Second, the date, though not old enough for my liking is slowly pushing the accepted dates into the 20,000s BP. Finally, DNA studies which set dates based on "facts" from archaeology should revise these "facts". If humans appeared earlier than 300 kya, or if the OOA event never existed, it would surely shake up the conclusions made by geneticists based on these "facts".

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2026 by Austin Whittall © 

Orangutans and humans - are they our closest relative?

Continuing with my series on the evolution of humans (in my previous posts, I discussed the split between chimpanzees & bonobos, and humans), today I will look into the possible links between humans and orangutans.

The orangutan

Orangutan. Source

The orangutans are the great apes that live in Asia (the other great apes are African). Their habitat, encroached by humans has reduced their geographic territory that spanned Southeast Asia and the south of China and now is reduced to some areas of Indonesia, in Sumatra and Borneo.

Orangutans (by the way, their name, in Malay, means orang = "man" and hutan = "forest"; "forest person"), belong to the genus Pongo and comprise three separate species, one living in Borneo (P. pygmaeus) and the other two in Sumatra (P. abelii and P. tapanuliensis).

Nevertheless, we share roughly 97% of our genome with the orangutans. They are believed to have split from the rest of the hominids (that include humans and the African great apes) around 9 to 13 million years ago (Source). With such a distant split time, it is difficult to believe that we may descend from them. The orthodox viewpoint is that we split from a common ancestor of the chimpanzee lineage some 6 million years ago.

The first to propose some kind of ancestry between humans and apes was the French naturalist Jean Baptiste Lamarck (1744-1829), in his work Philosophie Zoologique, p.352 he describes the Angola orang (chimpanzee) as "the most highly developed of animals; it is far superior to the orang of the Indies (Simia satyrus L.) —known as the orangutan—yet, in terms of physical structure, both are vastly inferior to man in both bodily and intellectual faculties." So, the chimpanzee was also known as "orang", but clearly the Indonesian ("Indies") variant was the real orangutan.

Charles Lyell (1797-1875) in his Principles of Geology p.575, criticized "Lamarck's theory of the transformation of the orang-outan into the human species" (worth reading). Later, Charles Darwin, applied Lyell's geological ideas to biology and created the theory of evolution by natural selection (published in his famous book, On the origin of species, 1859). Darwin also wrote about the origin of modern humans in his work "The Descent of Man", 1871 see p. 240, where he speculates the birthplace of humans "In each great region of the world the living mammals are closely related to the extinct species of the same region. It is therefore probable that Africa was formerly inhabited by extinct apes closely allied to the gorilla and chimpanzee ; and as these two species are now man’s nearest allies, it is somewhat more probable that our early progenitors lived on the African continent than elsewhere. But it is useless to speculate on this subject; for two or three anthropomorphous apes, one the Dryopithecus of Lartet, nearly as large as a man, and closely allied to Hylobates, existed in Europe during the Miocene age; and since so remote a period the earth has certainly undergone many great revolutions, and there has been ample time for migration on the largest scale" This is often cited by Out-Of-Africa supporters who only mention the first part (African origin from chimps or gorillas), omitting the second part (possible Eurasian origin and migration). He adds, on p. 255 "We may thus ascend to the Lemuridae; and the interval is not very wide from these to the Simiadae. The Simiadae then branched off into two great stems, the New World and Old World monkeys; and from the latter, at a remote period, Man, the wonder and glory of the Universe, proceeded." Indeed, we split from Old World apes, but which? Chimpanzees or orangutans?

We share many traits with Orangutans

There are many similarities that reveal that we are closer to them than to chimpanzees. For instance: roughly 0.8% of our genome is closer to orangutans than to chimpanzee. See: Hobolth, A. et al. Incomplete lineage sorting patterns among human, chimpanzee, and orangutan suggest recent orangutan speciation and widespread selection. Genome Research 21, 349-356 (2011); and Locke, D.P. et al. Comparative and demographic analysis of orangutan genomes. Nature 469, 529-533 (2011).

John Grehan of the Buffalo Museum of Science, NY, USA, and Jeffrey Schwartz of the University of Pittsburg, PA, USA, coauthored a paper (John R. Grehan and Jeffrey H. Schwartz. Evolution of the second orangutan: phylogeny and biogeography of hominid origins. Journal of Biogeography, 2009 DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2699.2009.02141.x) putting forward the idea that humans evolved from the orangutans. Schwartz had already championed this cause in his 2005 book The red ape: orangutans and human origins, and Grehan has published about this same idea in 2006 (more below).

In their 2009 article, they argue that morphology shows that humans and orangutans share 28 unique physical traits compared to 2 with chimps and 7 with gorillas. Another 7 features are shared with all three apes, and finally, chimpanzees and gorillas share 11 features, placing them closer together.

Furthermore, the DNA record is patchy with large gaps in the sequences, so it can't be used conclusively to support a common ancestry with chimps.

Another factor that is seldom taken into account, is that there are no fossils linking humans with chimpanzees.

Both authores propose that humans and orangutans shared a common ancestor, in Asia, that originated the organgutans in Southeast Asia, and then migrated west across Asia, to Africa and Europe some 12 million years ago when this region was forested and formed a single ecosystem. Then, the western branch evolved into a group of apes that later became extinct, and, the first Homo individuals.

Since the fossils of apes in Africa are not older than 500,000 years, and there are older fossils in Europe, the orthodox viewpoint is that the apes originated in Africa, migrated to Europe, and from there to Asia (the orangutan ancestors), and then, returned to Africa to generate the African apes and humans. The authors argue that this is too complicated to be true.

The paper also compared Australopiths and orangutans, who share 8 traits in common and with early humans, and 7 traits between themselves.

Grehan wrote, in his earlier work, in 2006 (Mona Lisa smile: The morphological enigma of human and great ape evolution. The Anatomical Record Part B: The New Anatomist. 289B. 139-157. 10.1002/ar.b.20107.) that the similar shape (morphology) of 28 human and orangutan features vs. only eight between humans and chimpanzees "suggests there is very little in morphology to support a unique common ancestor for humans and chimpanzees... The uniquely shared morphology of humans and orangutans raises doubts about the almost universal belief that DNA sequence similarities necessarily demonstrate a closer evolutionary relationship between humans and chimpanzees." Grehan then examines similarities in detail, such as male mustache and beard, concealed female ovulation, long pair-bonding and prolonged mating, tool use, art, and "house" building.

The article includes the following phylogenetic tree:

Original caption: Phylogenetic and taxonomic implications of the human-orangutan relationship for selected fossil and living taxa (after Schwartz, 1986). The oldest fossil records for each genus are in bold. Daggers denote extinct taxa; solid circles, the approximately 40 uniquely shared features for humans and orangutans inherited by all hominid- and orangutan-related lineages; solid squares, primitive retentions of orangutan-like characters in earlyhominids that were later lost in Homo. Hominids (such as Australopithecus, Homo, and Orrorin) represent the sister group of orangutans and their fossil relatives (represented hereby Sivapithecus). These taxa comprise the sister group living thin-enameled great apesalong with potential fossil members such as Morotopithecus (Schwartz, 1983) comprising the family Panidae and various other thin-enameled fossil apes (Dryopithecidae). The lesser apes (Hylobatidae) and Old World monkeys comprise successively more distantly related anthropoid apes. From Grehan, 2006

My last post noted that the PtERV 1 repeat found in all African apes (chimps, gorillas, bonobos), and many Eurasian ones, is completely absent in orangutans and humans. This could imply a common trait in both species that shielded them from this retroviral infection, or even an isolation in Eurasia for both species that preserved them from the infection.

Interestingly, the DNA of orangutans differs from human and chimpanzee DNA, they split around 12 million years ago from the branch leading to us and chimps yet have undergone fewer mutations than the latter species: " the orangutan has evolved much more slowly than chimpanzees and humans. The orangutan genome has fewer large DNA sequence structural rearrangements than its chimpanzee and human counterparts. Large genome structural rearrangements are DNA mutations that result in large genomic segments being duplicated, deleted, inserted or inverted... "In terms of evolution, the orangutan genome is quite special among great apes in that it has been extraordinarily stable over the past 15 million years"" (Source), chimpanzees and humans "lose and gain new genes at twice the rate of orang-utans." (Source). This is indeed odd. Could it be possible that the split date has been calculated wrong? If the split date was more recent, say 6 million years ago, their mutation rate would be the same as that of the other great apes. It would also bring them closer to us.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2026 by Austin Whittall © 

PtERV 1 a fact that marks the difference between humans and African apes

In a previous post, I mentioned the strange virus that infected all African great apes, but didn't affect humans, it is known as PtERV 1.

PtERV 1 is an endogenous retrovirus found in chimpanzees (Pan troglodyte). And it gets its name from the initials of Pan troglodyte endogenous retrovirus (PtERV).

Let's first explain what it is.

Retroviruses are a type of virus (an example is HIV, that causes AIDS) that instead of store their genetic information as RNA. They differ from other virus because when a retrovirus infects a cell, it uses a special enzyme called reverse transcriptase to convert its RNA into DNA (hence its name "retro", from this reverse transcription). This DNA is then inserted into the host's DNA strand, and the cell reads it as if it was its own. In this way the cell makes copies of the virus, propagating it.

When a retrovirus is inserted into a cell that later becomes an egg or sperm, it can be passed on, within the cell's DNA, into the next generation, who inherit it as part of their genetic material. This is known as an "endogenous retrovirus" because it comes from within, inherited. The acronym ERV applies to Endogenous Retrovirus.

Humans carry ERVs in their genes, the outcome of ancient infections in our distant ancestral monkey relatives around 25 million years ago. But we don't carry the PtERV 1 variant. Neither do orangutans. The insertions are only found in African apes like gorillas, baboons, macaques, and chimpanzees.

Research (see Yohn, et al., 2005) reported that an ancient retrovirus infected "ancestral gorilla and chimpanzee lineages 3–4 million years ago", after humans had split from the lineage of chimpanzees. The infection took place at the same time, leading to very similar insertions into the genomes of gorillas and chimpanzees. PtERV 1 is also found in baboons and macaques, but there are differences between their genetics, suggesting a later infection ~1.5 million years ago, and by slightly mutated retrovirus.

We don't know which retrovirus caused this infection but it is likely a gammaretrovirus (there is no known gammaretrovirus that infects humans) and it shares roughly half of its genome with virus linked to leukemia in cats and rats (feline leukemia and murine leukemia viruses). The authors suggest that the infection was caused by a "retrovirus [that] was introduced into the great ape lineages by horizontal transmission, perhaps from contact with an ancient Old World monkey species."

Why didn't humans, or our Homo ancestors (H. habilis, H. erectus, etc.) become infected within Africa, as the virus spread among all other African apes and many Asian ones? Why were the orangutan and other Asian apes preserved from the infection?

• Not infected: humans, orangutan, siamang, and white-handed gibbon.
• Infected: African. Gorilla, bonobo, chimpanzee, Abyssinian black-and-white colobus monkey, olive baboon, gelada baboon, Hamadryas baboon, drill, mona, Black crested mangabey.
  Asian monkeys: rhesus macaque (South, Central, and SE Asia), Japanese macaque (Snow monkey), Sichuan snub-nosed monkey (Central China), Long-tailed macaque (SE Asia), Tibetan macaque, gelada baboon, , lion tailed monkey (India), Celebes macaque (Indonesia), Myanmar snub-nosed monkey (Myanmar and South China)



The following image, from Abu Eed, et al., 2025 (Fig. 7) shows in red, the monkey species infected with PtERV-1, in black, those that are not infected.







The paper speculates that the gorillas and chimpanzees were probably more susceptible, or that our Homo ancestors were resistant or immune (so were the Asian orangutans). Though, the orangutans lived far from Africa and distance could have preserved them, isolated from infection.




An interesting option is that "the lineage that ultimately gave rise to humans did not occupy the same habitat as the ancestral chimpanzee and gorilla lineages. An excursion by early hominids to Eurasia during the time that PTERV1 infected African great apes and then a return to Africa would explain this phylogenetic inconsistency." Or, may I add, if Homo originated in Asia, and evolved there, it may have entered Africa hundreds of thousands of years later, even millions, once the retroviral infection and its source had vanished. This would have protected them from infection. But, it does not explain why equally distant Asian monkeys caught it!




Since Into Africa or Out of Eurasia theories are not favored by mainstream scholars, the paper also suggests that population structure could have somehow preserved our ancestors from infection. But this explanation would require very large populations of humans and orangutans in comparison to those of gorillas and chimpanzees, which is unlikely.




Another option is considered briefly but quickly dismissed "the PTERV1 phylogenetic tree is inconsistent with the generally accepted species tree for primates, suggesting a horizontal transmission as opposed to a vertical transmission from a common ape ancestor.An alternative explanation may be that the primate phylogeny is grossly incorrect, as has been proposed by a minority of anthropologists [29]. This seems unlikely in light of the extensive molecular evolutionary data that have been collected over the last few years [5,25] that clearly place orangutan as the outgroup species to the human–chimpanzee–gorilla clade and Old World monkeys as an outgroup to the human/ape lineage."




The "antropologist" cited as [29] is: Schwartz JH. The evolutionary relationships of man and orang-utans. Nature. 1984;308:501–505. doi: 10.1038/308501a0. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]




Comments




The most parsimonious explanation is that humans and our Homo ancestors evolved in Asia, in a region that was isolated from the infection. Orangutans may be closer to us, as suggested by Schwartz than chimpanzees. They too lived isolated from the other apes that caught it, or, maybe they share with humans some protecting factor.




My next post will look into Schwartz and his orangutan-human link.




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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2026 by Austin Whittall © 

Chromosome 2 - Uniquely human

In a recent post, I wrote about the split between chimpanzees, bonobos, and the Homo genus, and also looked into the possibility that the split took place in Eurasia. In this post we will discuss a little known fat that sets us, humans, apart from all other apes, the fact that we have 23 pairs of chromosomes, while they have 24.

Humans have 23 pairs (46 chromosomes) while the other apes have 24 pairs (48 chromosomes)

We often read that chimpanzees and bonobos share roughly 99% of their genetic material with humans. They are our closest living relatives, but we couldn't mate with them successfully because our number of chromosomes differs.

The African gorillas, chimpanzees, and bonobos, and the Asian orangutans, extant apes, all carry 24 pairs of chromosomes, a total of 48. We, humans (and also our Neanderthal and Denisovan ancestors) carry 23 pairs, with 46 chromosomes in total. This feature sets us apart from all of the great apes.

Changes in the number, shape, or structure of the chromosomes in a species plays a role in evolution, leading to the formation of new species (speciation). This phenomenon, known as "karyotype evolution" (karyotype is the array of chromosomes in a given species) was first detected by Wilson and Painter in 1935, who observed the fusion of chromosomes in fruit flies.

Fusion is what happened to reduce the number of chromosomes carried by humans. Two chromosomes in apes, known as chromosome 2a and chromosome 2b, fused together forming our chromosome 2. So the total count dropped from 24 to 23 pairs.

The following image, from Culajay, 2025, shows how our chromosome 2 (top) aligns with chromosomes 2a and 2b in chimps, gorillas, and orangutans:

The process of fusion of two chromosomes is complex (see Ijdo et al., 1991 and Fan et al., 2002). I prepared the following image to clarify the process. A regular pair of chromosomes, "X" shape to the left is composed of two individual chromosomes linked up at their "centromeres". During cellular division inside a cell, fibers attach to the centromere and and pulls the chromosomes apart, half going to one side, the other half going to the opposite side of the dividing cell. So centromeres play an important role in regulating the division of cells, and reproduction, where the sexual cells carry half the chromosome load compared to regular ones.

Chr 2a and 2b fuse, making human Chr 2. Copyright © 2026 by Austin Whittall

The tips of each chromosme have "telomeres", which act as protective caps located and help maintain the chromosome's structure and stability. They are a long DNA helix with a certain sequence combining the bases Cytosine (C), Thymine (T), Adenine (A), and Guanine (G) of the form 5'-(TTAGGG)_n-(CCCTAA)_m-3' (where 5' and 3' are specific carbon atoms, and "m" and "n" are the number of repeats of each sequence of bases and ranges between 800 and 2,500.

The fusion of chromosomes 2a and 2b led to the telomeres linking up, and to a new, fused, chromosome 2, with two centromeres. For the chromosome to be able to work, and be functional, one of the centromeres became deactivated, and we can see it, surviving as a relict in our chromosome 2. The telomeric regions fused together also survive, in an area known as 2q13 where the vestigial telomeres survive, with their respective 5'-(TTAGGG)_n-(CCCTAA)_m-3' sequences linked head to head.

This took place as a random mutation in one individual of a group of pre-human apes. And this individual when he or she mated with other members of the group, passed on this new trait to its descent, as we will see below.

Speciation, Homo genus appears

But how could an individual with 47 chromosomes mate with those with 48 chromosomes?

So, by chance or a random event, an individual is born, carrying the fused chromosome 2, a total of 47 chromosomes. It would be a fertile person, and could mate with other members (with 48 chromosomes).

The following image is from Stankiewicz, 2016(One pedigree we all may have come from - did Adam and Eve have the chromosome 2 fusion? Mol Cytogenet. 2016 Sep 26;9:72. doi: 10.1186/s13039-016-0283-3. PMID: 27708712; PMCID: PMC5037601). It is a diagram showing how one, the first, unique individual with 47 chromosomes can mate with others, despite carrying 47 chromosomes, and how, in a few generations, some individuals end up with 46 chromosomes (which include two copies of the fused chromosome 2), and speciation becomes fixed.

Stankiewicz proposes that the original group where the mutation arose was a "gorilla-like polygamous pedigree of a putative early modern human clan" It was in this group that the fused chromosome 2 became fixed as a homozygous element. The diagram shows a two parents, a male ◻ and a female ◯, in Generation I, who have one son, a male, of Generation II, who was the first to carry the fused chromosome 2 in a heterozygous form. This male is represented by ◩. He mates with different females ◯ who carry 48 chromosomes. They produce offspring in Generation III, some are of the regular "normal" kind, with 48 chromosomes both boys (◻) and a girls (◯), others carry 47 chromosomes boys (◩) and girls (◐). There are a number of miscarriages or stillborn babies caused by "chromosome imbalances" (▲)

Those who are heterozygous in the 3rd Generation, and mate with each other (◩ and ◐) will produce offspring in Generation IV, some of them will not be viable (▲), others will have 48 chromosomes like the original population (◻ and ◯), others will carry a heterozygous form with 47 chromosomes (◩, ◐), but some, few, will have 46 chromosomes, homozygous for the fused chromosome 2: boys (■) and girls (⚫)

Benefits of the fused chromosome

According to Stankiewicz, the 46 chromosome variant spread in this population because it provided an evolutionary advantage possibly linked to higher fertility or to improved brain and cognitive development. Furthermore, it could have promoted bipedalism, or physiological aspects such as "endurance running, or improved thermo-regulation by an enhanced sweating capacity".

Culajay, 2025 highlights the impact of the fused chromosome 2 on human evolution. The change altered the shape and therefore the functioning of our genome. It led to modifications in the shape of our pelvis that resulted in our bipedalism.

When did this event take place?

The short answer is that we don't know. Nevertheless, there are some educated guesses, as we will see below.

According to Jiang et al., 2024, the chromosome 2 fusion event "is not a recent evolutionary event but potentially occurred during African great ape speciation" adding that "Given fossil evidence that Australopithecus existed around 2-4 mya, Paranthropus around 1-3 mya, and the earliest Homo fossils around 2-3 mya, we speculate that this fusion event did arise in the genus Homo but rather occurred in ancestral great ape populations that would give rise to humans" (highlight is mine)

We know that this trait, the fused chromosome 2, is shared by our relatives, the Denisovans and Neanderthals: "We conclude that Denisovans and modern humans (and presumably Neandertals) shared a karyotype consisting of 46 chromosomes." (Reich et al., 2012). So the event that led to the fusion took place before the split between Neanderthals & Denisovans, and Humans. This makes it older than 800,000 years.

Research published by Dreszer et al., 2007. (Biased clustered substitutions in the human genome: The footprints of male-driven biased gene conversion. Genome Research, 17(10), 1420–1430. https://doi.org/10.1101/gr.6395807) analyzing "unexpected biased clustered substitutions (UBCS)" found close to telomeres, estimated that "the fusion occurred as recently as 740,000 years ago and no more than ∼3 million years ago." This is a wide range, spanning from the Denisovan-Neanderthal-Human split, backwards into the Homo erectus, Homo antecessor, or even the Homo naledi all of which may have shared with us the fused chromosome 2.

These UBCS statistics used by Dreszer were revised and improved by Poszewiecka et al., 2022 (Revised time estimation of the ancestral human chromosome 2 fusion. BMC Genomics. 2022 Aug 25; 23 (Suppl 6):616. doi: 10.1186/s12864-022-08828-7. PMID: 36008753; PMCID: PMC9413910). Their study of chromosome 2 (highlight is mine) "estimated its formation time at 0.9 Mya with a 95% confidence interval of 0.4-1.5 Mya"

Culajay, 2025, focusing on the effects of the fusion on bipedalis and pelvic shape argues that the date of this event is older than 5 million years ago because it ties in with the modification of hip shape observed in Australopithecus afarensis and the even earlier Ardipithecus ramidus (4.4 Mya): "The timing of the Chromosome 2 fusion is best placed more than 5 million years ago, possibly 6.9–7.4 Mya, near the divergence of humans and chimpanzees." (Highlight is mine)

Comments

Perhaps we may be able to obtain the genome of Homo erectus, or Homo floresiensis or other ancient hominins, and check if they have 46 or 48 chromosomes. This would help us learn if they are members of our "human" tree or not.

Another interesting point is that the fusion of chromosome 2 is clear scientific proof of evolution in action. A random event produces a mutant, and the mutation leads to a new species. This is a thorn in the side of "creationists" who can't explain it away. They do, of course, come up with ridiculous alternatives: they argue that the telomere fusion and centromere deactivation is a misinterpretation of the data; that God created humans with 46 chromosomes, and created apes with 46. God can create as he wishes. I rest my case.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2025by Austin Whittall © 

Gigantopithecus

The largest ape to have ever existed was the Gigantopithecus blacki. Its name combines the Greek words that mean precisely that: gigantos = giant and pithekos = ape.

To be more precise, it was the largest hominoid, a superfamily (Hominoidea) that comprises three families; the: Hylobatidae (gibbons), Pongidae (orangutans), and our closest relatives, the Hominidae (gorillas, bonobos, chimpanzees, and humans); as well as our extinct ancestors, the erectus, Neanderthals, Denisovans, etc.).

Gigantopithecus lived in Asia, and was closely related to the Pongo group (which includes the orangutan), it was a gigantic variety of orangutan. It was definitely Asian, as it descended from a line of Asian apes that included the 12 million year old Sivapitheucs and the 6.5 million year old Indopithecus, both from India.

The image above depicts a band of Gigantopithecus being watched by hominins (Source).

Gigantopithecus lived in the subtropical forests of Central China, close to what is now Chongqing on the Yangtze River, and fromt there southwards into to Vietnam and as far as Java, in Indonesia. It thrived between 2 million and 300,000 years ago. Like gorillas and orangutans, it munched fruit, leaves, and juicy stems, and maybe, tubers and roots.

It was discovered by a German paleontologist Ralph von Koenigswald (1902-1982), whose sharp eye noted a large primate tooth being sold as "dragon bones" in a traditional Chinese medicine shop in Hong Kong, in 1935. He named it after Canadian anthropologist Davidson Black (1884-1934), who had passed recently. Black had identified the remains of Homo erectus in Beijing, China, naming it Sinanthropus Pekinensis (China Man of Beijing).

Gigantopithecus lived up to its name, it was very big, probably weighing 200 to 300 kg (440 to 660 lbs). It was tall, measuring 2.7 to 3.7 m (9 to 12 feet). Twice the size of a modern gorilla.

Extinction

It was well adapted to its environment, yet, vanished suddenly around 300 kya. Orangutans managed to survive in the same habitat, which makes us ask why did the Gigantopithecus become extinct.

Zhang et al., 2024 attribute its demise to environmental changes that took place between 215 and 295 kya. Climate swings altered the vegetation coverage of that region, which switched from a blend of forests and grasslands to an open forest. Gigantopithecus didn't manage to adapt, and died out. Orangutans did, and survived until now.

Tool maker?

Han et al., 2024 reported the discovery of gigantopithecus teeth associated with teeth of "an undetermined hominid" between 1 and 1.5 million years ago at the Jianshi Longgudong site in China.

These hominid teeth were studied by different scholars over the course of the past 50 years, and have been attributed to a wide variety of hominids: Australopiths, Australopithecus robustuss, early Homo, Homo erectus, and even the Meganthropus. This suggests an overlap of archaic hominids with the Gigantopithecus. Could these hominids have hunted the Gigantopithecus and caused its extinction?

There is another site in China, Longgupo Cave, where Gigantopithecus co-existed with an archaic hominin believed to be either Homo erectus, or to "have the affinities with African Homo habilis and Homo ergaster (Huang et al., 1995). Since 2009, this specimen has been considered to belong to a “mystery ape” instead of Homo (Ciochon, 2009)."

This is really interesting, hearing about typically African hominids like Australopiths and Homo habilis, whose remains have not been found (yet) in Asia.

Others, however, believe it is an Asian variety of ape, like Wu, 2000.

Surprisingly, a primitive paleolithic stone tool "culture" that has been unearthed at the Longgupo site. Over 1,000 stone artifacts have been discovered there, dated between 2.5 and 1.8 million years old. These are old dates, and would more or less overlap with the most ancient remains found to date in Asia (mostly attributed to Homo erectus, and the H. georgicus from the Dmanisi site in Georgia), and even older than those as 2.5 million years corresponds to a very early date, for which no fossils have yet been discovered outside of Africa.

Wei et al., 2014 wrote that they are of an "evident human agency such as bipolar hammer, cores, flakes, choppers, points, scrapers, proto-cleavers, drilling tools, proto-picks and proto-hand-axes... Who the creators of Longgupo culture were is still a mystery. Three types of highly-evolved primate fossils have been unearthed from Longgupo Site. They are represented by a mandibular fragment with p4-m1, an upper incisor, and 14 isolated teeth of Gigantopithecus blacki respectively. All these three types could be the possible creators of Longgupo culture. On the other hand, we cannot exclude a possibility that an ancient human still unknown but similar to Homo habilis could be revealed with the forthcoming excavations." The image above is from Wei, 2014 and shows these remarkable stone tools.

Again, a paper suggesting the presencce of Homo habilis in Asia! Even more surprising is the suggestion that these stone tools could have been made by a non-hominin ape, the Gigantopithecus. This would be a unique situation as these tools are more sophisticated than the stone tools used by monkeys.

Han, et al., 2017, in an article, review the discussion on who made the tools as an ongoing controversy, and add that "the evidence of Gigantopithecus teeth and stone artifacts on the site is still interesting, as it could provide the first indication of non-hominin tool-using apes in East Asia..."

There is a third site showing an overlap of hominids and Gigantopithecus. And, once again the Chinese authors of the paper mention Australopiths! Wei et al., 2005 also report Gigantopithecus teeth in a cave at Mohui, in Guangxi, Southern China. They were found with teeth that have a strong resemblance to Australopith teeth, but "as there is no evidence supporting the existence of Aus-tralopithecus outside Africa to date, it is difficult to attribute [it] to this genus", instead, and despite the fact that they are larger than Chinese erectus teeth, they ".temporarily assign these teeth to Homo erectus." The stone tools at the site are crude, and date back to between 1.6 and 0.8 million years.

Closing Comments

There have been suggestions (see Stringer) of an ancient, first migration of prehuman hominins out of Africa (or originating in Eurasia) or one close to Australopithecines and Homo habilis that could have been the hominid mentioned in all of these Chinese-authored papers.

Regarding Gigantopithecus, I seriously doubt it managed to survive until the present, and although some publications have proposed it as an explanation for the North American bigfoot, I don't think it could have handled the cold, icy conditions of Siberia and Beringia. Others have proposed the Gigantopithecus as the answer for the myserious Yeti. This may be based on very ancient oral traditions, but it seems unlikely.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2026 by Austin Whittall © 

Chimp-Homo split in Eurasia?

Earlier this year, in my March 2nd post, I quoted Mansfield and Vaneechoutte, 2024 who put forward a new hypothesis about the split between Pan (chimpancees), Gorilla, and Homo. Instead of taking place in Africa, they argue that the split happened in Eurasia.

Since one of my recent posts dealt with the Chimpanzee-Human (Homo) spilt, assuming the orthodox view that it took place inside Africa, in today's post we will revisit the possibility of an Eurasian origin for the Homo genus.

Mansfield and Vaneechoutte's paper

In their article, Mansfield and Vaneechoutte elaborate on the lack of fossils inside Africa of a common ancestor for chimps, gorillas, and humans.

Focusing on the very early presence of apes in the Anatolia and the Balkans at 10 to 6 million years ago, they suggest that the closure of Gibraltar that led to the dissecation of the Mediterranean Sea (Messenian Salinity Event), and the very arid period that followed that event, forced the "separate branches of European hominids to migrate out of the Mediterranean region." This migration led the ancestors of gorillas and chimpanzees-bonobos across the dry seabed of the Mediterranean, from Greece, into Africa.

The authors believe that the ancestors of Gorilla and Pan entered Africa from Eurasia in two separate migratory events, and a third lineage, the one leading to Homo, and eventually to us, humans, moved in another direction into the Arabian Peninsula. There, these future Homo survived the hyperarid period that had forced them out of Europe.

Tectonic rifting led to thhe reopening of Gibraltar, and the vast Zanclean Megaflood that took place 5.3 million years ago modified the geography and cut-off potential routes of entry into Africa (like Sinai), by refilling the Mediterranean basin up, in just two years, and flooding the Sinai region and the Red Sea. Isolating the ancestors of Homo in a humid refuge in Arabia, isolated from all other apes.

The Pan lineage, of the chimpanzees and bonobos went deep into Africa and there, it split, with a branch evolving into the Australopithecines and the Paranthropus. These small-brained, small, primitive hominins are more adapted to a life in the trees than in the open savannas.

Homo, evolved, and produced the bigger, stronger, long-legged, brainier Homo erectus. This paper suggests that after the water levels dropped, coastal corridors and routes opened up, and these were used by erectus to walk westwards, into Africa, and east, crossing Eurasia from China and Indonesia, while the northern route through the Levant led to the Caucasus (Dmanisi) and Europe.

This theory was again put forward in a paper by Verhaegen, Munro, Bonne, Mansfield, & Vaneechoutte, 2026 (A hypothesis of ape and human evolution based on comparative biology and plate tectonics. Academia Biology, 4(2). https://doi.org/10.20935/AcadBiol8310) which is worth reading as it explains in detail the species, and gives a very good timeline for all these eventss.

Earlier, Böhme, 2017 had proposed an Eurasian origin of the Homo group and a Eurasian split between the ancestors of chimps and humans: suggesting that "the Pan-Homo split predated the Messinian and that the chimpanzee–human last common ancestor thrived in the Mediterranean region... major Miocene hominid radiations occurred outside Africa and endorse the hypothesis that the hominin clade arose in the Eastern Mediterranean."

However, these ideas are dismissed by mainstream scholars. I believe that the reason for this is that an African origin of Homo is crucial to the Out Of Africa theory.

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Patagonian Monsters - Cryptozoology, Myths & legends in Patagonia Copyright 2009-2026 by Austin Whittall ©