Raymond Dart
Raymond Dart (February 4 1893 – November 22 1988) was an Australian anatomist and anthropologist best known for his discovery in 1924 of a fossil of Australopithecus at Taung in Northwestern South Africa. The son of a farmer and tradesman, he was married twice and had two children.
He was born in Toowong, Australia and studied at Ipswich Grammar School, the University of Queensland, University of Sydney and University College, London, before taking a position as head of the newly established department of anatomy at the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa in 1922.
Taung Child
Taung Child refers to the fossil of a skull specimen of Australopithecus africanus. It was discovered in 1924 by quarryman working for the Northern Lime Company in Taung, South Africa. Raymond Dart, an anatomist at the University of Witwatersrand, received the artifact, recognized its importance and published his discovery in the journal Nature in 1925, describing it as a new species. Unfortunately, the British establishment was at the time enamored with the hoax Piltdown man, which had a large brain and ape-like teeth — the exact opposite of the Taung Child — and Raymond Dart's finding was not appreciated for decades.
Taung Child is believed to have been a three-year-old being at the time of its death 2.5 million years ago. It was a creature standing 3' 6" at approximately 75 pounds. Taung Child had a cranial capacity of 340cc, living mainly in a savanna habitat. Examinations of Taung Child compared to that of an equivalent 9-year-old child suggest that A. africanus had a growth rate to adolescence the same as in modern apes like chimpanzees (genus Pan) than compared with modern Homo sapiens. However intermediate species such as Homo ergaster/Homo erectus are thought to have gone through growths intermediate between modern humans and apes. The evidence has mostly been based on that of Turkana Boy discovered in 1984.
Its significance lies in the fact that this was the first of the fossils which had been found in the twenties and thirties to prove that the human race does indeed have a 'natural history' all of its own - just as Darwin had predicted. (Which is not quite the same as accepting Darwinism for an explanation of the relationship between the australopithecines and the hominids - which Darwin never offered -, but it does lay down the time-scales and the factual basis for a discussion about our own ancestors which includes 'proto-culture' as one of the variables in such a 'reconstruction' of our collective past.)
In early 2006 it was announced [1] that the Taung Child was likely killed by an eagle (or similar large predatory bird). This conclusion was reached by noting similarities in the damage to the skull and eye sockets of the Taung Child to the skulls of primates known to have been killed by modern eagles.
The skull is now (as of 2006) exhibited at the Maropeng visitor's centre at the Cradle of Humankind.
External links
In 1924, a limestone quarry owner at Taung shipped Dart a box of fossiliferous rock. Digging around in it, Dart found an endocranial cast, and then it's matching fossil skullpiece. (Source: Lucy) Dart examined this Taung Child fossil, as it came to be known, and pronounced it to be a new species, Australopithecus africanus. Dart postulated his new find to be a missing link between apes and humans because of its small brain size, but relatively human-like dentition and a probable upright posture.
Dart's discovery and Dart himself were initially heavily criticized by the eminent anthropologists of the day, most notably Sir Arthur Keith who claimed the Taung Child to be nothing other than a juvenile gorilla. Because the specimen was indeed a juvenile, there was a lot of room for interpretation, and because African origins for mankind and the development of bipedalism before a human-like brain were both inconsistent with the prevailing evolutionary notions of the time, Dart and his Child became the butt of many attacks.
Dart's closest ally was Robert Broom whose discoveries of further australopithecines, as well as Wilfrid Le Gros Clark's support eventually vindicated Dart. So much so that in 1947, Sir Arthur Keith said "...Dart was right, and I was wrong."
Not all of Dart's ideas are accepted today, however. His assertion that gazelle long-bones found in association with Australopithecus africanus were used as tools is unproven and largely dismissed. Dart also originated the killer ape theory; although some other anthropologists, notably Robert Ardrey, defended or further developed the theory, it is not generally accepted today.
Dart continued in his position as director of the School of Anatomy at University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, until 1958. There he worked with Phillip Tobias who continues his work to this day, and has contributed to the study of Cradle of Humanity. In 1959, an autobiographical account of his discovery was published called Adventures with the Missing Link.. The Institute for the Study of Man in Africa was founded at Witwatersrand in his honor.
External links
Bibliography
- Dart R.A. (1925): Australopithecus africanus: the man-ape of South Africa. Nature, 115:195-9 (the original paper communicating the Taung finding, in PDF format).
- Dart, Raymond and Craig, Dennis. Adventures with the Missing Link. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1959 (autobiography).
- Fagan, Brian. The Passion of Raymond Dart. Archaeology v. 42 (May-June 1989): p. 18.
- Johanson, Donald & Maitland Edey. Lucy: The Beginnings of Humandkind. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1990 ISBN 0671250361
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