In 1912, a British lawyer from Dawson claimed to have found early human fossils, which were later identified by British experts as human fossils from 500,000 years ago, which was enough to prove that the earliest humans were British! But more than 40 years later, it was discovered that this was a shocking hoax, and the British scientific community was disgraced!
It is the famous Piertang ancient fossil forgery case!
In the early 20th century, Europe was keen on archaeology, because Darwin's theory of evolution was already deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, believing that "man is a monkey to become", then in the process of evolution, there must be a "both humanoid and ape-like" creature, and who can find this fossil will become a well-known hero in human history.
Across the European continent, Britain also set off an archaeological fever. At that time, there was a lawyer named Dawson, who was very fond of collecting and archaeology, and had excavated many fossils and Neolithic stone axes and other cultural relics, which could be regarded as a well-known amateur archaeologist.
During a fortuitous excavation, Dawson found a bone-like fragment and identified it as a human skull. So he immediately informed his friend of the news, Sir Woodward, head of the Geology Department of the British Museum.
Sir Woodward, one of the world's most authoritative paleontologists at the time, was working hard to find paleontological fossils in an attempt to validate Darwin's theory of evolution so that it could survive for centuries.
When Sir Woodward heard the news, he was ecstatic, as if he were only one step away from success. He immediately rushed to the excavation site and excavated with Dawson and others, and finally after a long period of excavation, they found several skull fragments and a jaw fragment.
Sir Woodward was ecstatic to bring the fossils back to the British Museum, and put the jaw together with other skulls, and filled the missing part with clay with clay imaginaryly.
When I finished spelling it, I found that this was a fossil skull of a half-human, half-ape animal that people had never found before. Sir Woodward thought to himself: Isn't this the fossil of an ancient human he is looking for?
Sir Woodward, based on animal fossils unearthed in the same formation, was an ancient human that lived about 500,000 years ago, and named it the "Pertangian" because it was discovered in Pertang, Sussex, England.
When he came to this conclusion, he could no longer control his joy. Because he knew that he would truly be remembered by the world. Unfortunately, at this time, he would not have thought that future generations would indeed forget him, but it was because he personally created a huge British science scandal.
On 28 December 1912, at the Geological Society of England in London, Sir Woodward made this blockbuster news public and declared without modesty that it was a great historical discovery.
As he expected, as soon as the news came out, it attracted the attention of the whole world. The British are proud of this, because the earliest human fossils found in the United Kingdom mean that the British are the ancestors of human beings, and the United Kingdom is the birthplace of the entire human civilization!
Other countries, led by Germany, were naturally dissatisfied, but based on Sir Woodward's prestige and the technical constraints of the time, others could not come up with strong rebuttal evidence.
As a result, the assertion that the Piltangs were a key link in the evolution of mankind began to dominate scientific common sense in academia.
In the more than forty years since then, countless scholars have devoted themselves to this industry and joined the study of the "Peltons", but who would have thought that in the end it would be a void, and a lifetime would be trapped in a shocking deception.
With the advancement of science and technology, a new method for determining fossil dating, the "fluoridine dating method", has matured. Finally, scholars who dared to challenge the truth stood up, and they tested the "Pertang people", and the truth was shocked.
They found that the skull of the "Peltang" was partly from modern humans, about 620 years ago, belonging to medieval humans, while the mandible was derived from modern female orangutans, about 500 years ago.
When the results of this test were published, it immediately caused a sensation around the world. The forgery of the "Pertang skull" also became the most sensational "British scandal" of the year.
The most unacceptable to the truth of this matter is naturally the British, and some British newspapers have reported that the skull of the unique, respectable, and famous Pedang people in the scientific community is fake, and 500,000 years of history have been wiped out.
Chengye "Pertang people", defeat also "Pertang people", a deception that has deceived the world for more than 40 years, actually occurred in such a civilized and developed country as Britain, which humiliated Britain and became a laughingstock in the British archaeological community.
The "Peltang skull", which has been stored in the British Museum for decades and is regarded as a national treasure, has long been secretly removed by the staff and thrown into the basement.
In this earth-shattering deception, sadly in addition to the British, there is also a group of scholars who have worked hard to study the "Pertang people" for half a lifetime. When the "Piltang people" were proved to be fake, it also meant that they had struggled for half a lifetime, and they had all done nothing.
This is much worse than those who have to revise their papers overnight because of the banning of stars and the collapse of the company!
So who will be the person who created this scam, and what is its purpose? Dawson? Or Sir Woodward?
No one can answer this question anymore. #考古 #
