Peking Man Dating and the Loss of the Zhoukoudian Fossils

Record summary

Zhoukoudian’s Homo erectus remains were central to accounts of early human occupation in East Asia, but the original fossils disappeared during the Second World War. During the 1970s and 1980s, researchers continued working with casts, archived records, associated faunal material, and new dating methods. Questions concerned chronology, site formation, fire use, cannibalism claims, and whether old interpretations overstated behavioral conclusions. The lead matters for comparing how missing primary specimens, changing analytical methods, and national scientific narratives affect the reconstruction of deep human history.