The Plesianthropus Skull

Abstract

DR. R. BROOM'S account¹ of the new Plesianthropus skull makes it possible to take another step towards assigning to this form the place it occupies in the Primate series. His Fig. 2 shows clearly that the lacrimal and the ethmoid articulate over a wide area in the orbit. Possibly, the sphenoid and ethmoid articulate superficially in the anterior fossa (Fig. 1), although it is very difficult to accept Broom's hypothetical median part of the suture line as being correctly placed. In both cases the likeness with the Asiatic rather than with the African anthropoids is noted by Broom ; but he makes no mention of the condition of the typically simian maxillary-premaxillary suture present on the face. The features that Broom has already described appear to verify the dictum of Klaatsch that “the less an ape has changed from its original form just so much the more human it appears”, and perhaps agreement could be reached by assuming that Plesianthropus is a primitive and generalized anthropoid ape that has not attained to all the specializations characteristic of the modern apes, and is therefore nearer to the basal stock of the Primates from which man arose.