This find put England and East Sussex at the pinnacle of paleoanthropology. Nothing like this has been discovered in Europe before, ”said anthropologist Dr. Karol Piasecki.
On November 21, 1953, scientists exposed one of the greatest falsifications in the history of science. It turned out that the Piltdown Man didn’t exist, and his discovery was one big hoax.
In pursuit of the homonid
It all started on December 18, 1912. Then Charles Dawson, an amateur geologist, and Arthur Smith Woodward, curator of the Geological Department of the British Museum, announced at a meeting of the Geological Society of London that they had found a “missing link” between ape and man. … It was a worldwide sensation. Dawson claimed to have found the skull of an unknown hominid at Piltdown, a village near Uckfield in East Sussex.
Feeling follows sensation
This discovery was consistent with the claims of many scientists of the time that this species should have a skull similar to a human, and a jaw that looks like a monkey. They were to be confirmed by subsequent finds made in the area. After the discovery was announced in 1913, a third researcher joined Dawson and Woodward. He was a French theologian, philosopher, anthropologist and paleontologist, Jesuit priest Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. He, in turn, reported that he had found a damaged canine, corresponding to the lower jaw, found earlier by Dawson.
A year later, the world learns about another sensational discovery. This time, workers dug out of the gravel a bludgeon-like ivory tool. In 1915, Charles Dawson announces that he has found another “Piltdown Man” two miles from where he was.
Missed link
How is it possible that scientists so easily believed the theory put forward by Dawson and endorsed by Woodward? Maria Bobrowska asked about this in an interview with Dr. Karol Piasecki from the Department of Historical Anthropology of the Institute of Archeology of the University of Warsaw, awarded in February 1998.
“We know without a doubt that it was a big rally, partly for a joke, partly for fame, but with the understanding that it will open in many years,” said the guest of the broadcast. And he added, “The Piltdown Skull is an example of a rally that should have filled the gap.” There was no intermediate link, which probably never was between Australopithecus and humans, and someone, we already know, who decided to play and joke with scientists, said Karol Pyasetsky.
The truth comes out
On November 21, 1953, a big scientific hoax was revealed. “The Piltdown Man does not exist,” you could have read that day in all the English newspapers. The 40-year theory of discovery collapsed as hard as it was announced. A second examination of the alleged “Piltdown Man” carried out in the late 1940s by the British Museum showed that the found lower jaw was artificially stained and the teeth were filed. The spectacular 1912 discovery turned out to be a big fake.